MAKERS   OF   AMERICA" 


CHARLES  SUMNER 

BY 

ANNA  LAURENS   DAWES 


In  the  world's  final  estimate  character  goes  farther  than  acl 
and  its  leaders  strike  us  as  much  by  what  they  were  as  by  wh^L 
they  did. — JOHN  MORLEY. 

Sumner  had  before  him  great  ideals  of  principles,  nothing  l&s 
than  the  eternal  laws  of  God,  and  a  determination  that  these  prin 
ciples  should  be  embodied  in  action.  —  M.  E.  S. 


(   UNIVERSITY 

\  OF 

NEW  YORK 
DODD,  MEAD  AND  COMPANY 


. 


<" 

V 


Copyright,  180S, 
BY  DODD,  MEAD  AND  Co. 


All  rights  reserved. 


SPRECKELS 


Slntbersttg 
jfoHN  WILSON  AND  SON,  CAMBRIDGE. 


TO 


In  token  of  a  debt  I  cannot  pay,  for  inspiration, 

encouragement,  and  the  wisest 

criticism. 


PREFACE. 


IN  attempting  to  write  a  life  of  CHARLES  SUMNER  I 
was  met  at  the  outset  with  the  practical  diffi 
culty  which  specially  confronts  those  who  would 
write  of  a  time  only  just  passed.  Should  I  assume 
a  knowledge  of  recent  history  on  the  part  of  the 
reader,  or  should  I  assume  his  ignorance  of  those 
events  which  made  the  background  of  Sumner's 
life ;  in  other  words,  should  I  write  for  those  who 
already  knew  more  than  I  could  hope  to  know  of 
those  events,  or  for  the  generation  that  now  is,  which 
as  a  matter  of  fact  knows  nothing  of  a  time  too  far 
away  for  personal  knowledge  and  too  near  for  written 
history  ?  Upon  consideration,  it  seemed  better  to  so 
write  the  story  of  this  man's  life  that  it  should  be 
a  whole  story,  and  that  the  reader  need  not  look 
elsewhere  to  find  any  fact  essential  to  comprehen 
sion  of  the  situation. 


VI  PREFACE. 

This  course  has  frequently  compelled  statements 
of  facts  so  familiar  that  their  repetition  seems  almost 
impertinent ;  while  on  the  other  hand  the  very  limited 
space  has  compelled  a  rapidity  of  movement  which 
destroys  all  proportion,  and  which  prevents  that  free 
dom  of  quotation  which  allows  a  man  to  become  his 
own  biographer.  But  I  have  sought,  so  far  as  I  might, 
to  put  myself  once  more  in  the  atmosphere  of  a  time 
half  remembered  and  long  a  familiar  household  tale, 
and  to  write  of  Mr.  Sumner  from  the  midst  of  his 
own  political  surroundings. 

In  this  effort  I  have  been  greatly  assisted  by  the 
memories  of  many  of  his  friends,  men  and  women 
both,  who  have  not  yet  forgotten  him  or  his  work, 
and  to  them  all  I  make  acknowledgment;  and 
especially  I  am  indebted  to  one  who  for  almost  the 
whole  of  Sumner's  Congressional  life  was  his  asso 
ciate  and  colleague,  whose  personal  knowledge  has 
corrected  or  confirmed  much  that  has  come  to  me 
from  other  sources.  For  the  earlier  years  of  Mr. 
Sumner's  life  I  am  almost  altogether  indebted  to  the 
incomparable  biography  of  Mr.  EDWARD  L.  PIERCE, 
after  whom  there  is  no  new  thing  left  to  say  or  to 
discover.  I  am  also  under  obligation  to  the  great 
kindness  and  courtesy  of  Mr.  ARNOLD  B.  JOHNSON, 
from  whom  I  learned  much  that  no  one  else  .could 


PREFACE.  Vll 

give  me.  Besides  the  records  and  documents,  I  am  in 
debt  to  a  long  list  of  political  histories,  biographies, 
reminiscences,  contemporary  articles,  and  other  writ 
ings  which  it  would  be  tedious  to  mention  in 
detail. 

ANNA   LAURENS    DAWES. 

PlTTSFIELD,  MASS. 


CONTENTS. 


ANCESTORS 


CHAPTER   I. 

i 


CHAPTER   II.  — 1811-1837. 


EARLY  LIFE  AND  EDUCATION.— VISJX--TO  WASHING 
TON. —  LAW  PRACTICE  IN  BOSTON 7 

CHAPTER  111,^1837-1840. 
EUROPEAN  JOURNEY 22 

CHAPTER  IV.  — 1840-1845. 

LAW  PRACTICE  IN  BOSTON.  — DOMESTIC  LIFE.  — PER 
SONAL  CHARACTERISTICS.  —  .SOCIAL.  POSITION.  — 
ORATION,  "JPRUE  GRANDEUR  OF  NAttOHs "  .  .  .  34 

CHAPTER  ¥.  —  1845-1850. 

POLITICAL  CONDITIONS,  1840-1850. — FREE-SOIL  PARTY. 
—  SUMNER'S  FIRST  INTEREST  IN  POLITICS. — .Bos-  . 
TON  OSTRACISM.  —  LITERARY  ORATIONS    ....    44 

CHAPTER  VI. 
SLAVERY 55 


CONTENTS. 
CHAPTER   VII.  — 1850,  1851. 

PAGH 

ENTRANCE  INTO  POLITICS.  —  FIRST  ELECTION  TO  THE 

SENATE 62 

CHAPTER  VIII.  — 1851,  1852. 

FUGITIVE  .SLAVE  BILL.  —  SPEECH,  "FREEDOM  NA 
TIONAL  ;  SLAVERY  SECTIONAL  " 74 

CHAPTER  IX.  — 1852-1856. 

POLITICAL  CONDITIONS.  —  FIRST  TERM  IN  SENATE.  — 

KANSAS-NEBRASKA  STRUGGLE. — PUBLIC  SPEECHES      86 

CHAPTER   X. 
SOCIAL  LIFE  IN  WASHINGTON 99 

CHAPTER  XL  — 1856. 

SUMNER'S  SPEECH,  "THE  CRIME  AGAINST  KANSAS."  — 

ASSAULT.  —  ILLNESS.  —  RECEPTION  AT  BOSTON     .     108 

>TER   XII.  — 1856-1859. 

.  —  SUMNER'S  SECOND  ELEC 
TION  TO  SATE^— LIFE  ABROAD.  —  RECOVERY  .     121 

CHAPTER   XIII.— 1860,  1861. 

POLITICAL  AND  SOCIAL  CONDITIONS  ON  RETURN  TO 
WASHINGTON.  —  SPEECH  ON  KANSAS.  — SUMNER 
AND  SEVVARD 135 

CHAPTER   XIV.— 1861,  1862. 

BEGINNING  OF  WAR.  —  WORK  OF  CONGRESS.  —  SUM 
NER  AND  THE  ADMINISTRATION. —  SPEECH  ON  THE 

...    ,' *.    . Ti    T*.    154 


CONTENTS.  XI 

CHAPTER   XV.  —  1862,  1863. 

PAGE 

FOREIGN  AFFAIRS.  —  ANTf-SLAVERY  "LEGISLATION.  — 
THE  SENATE.  —  ^ls^^^^^^^d^:  THIRD 
ELECTION  TO  SENATE/^I^r^r'V  .....  168 

CHAPTER    XVI.  —  1863. 
EMANCIPATION    .    ,    .    .   *.    ..........    178 

CHAPTER  XVII.  —  1863-1865. 

SUMNER    AND    THE    SENATE.  —  FINANCIAL    AND    GEN 

ERAL  LEGISLATION.  —  APPOINTMENT  OF  CHIEF-JUS 
TICE  CHASE.  —  PACIFIC  RAILROAD   ......    187 

CHAPTER   XVIII.—  1863-1865. 

ELECTION  OF  LINCOLN  AND  JOHNSON.  —  SUMNER'S 
POSITION.  —  GENERAL  LEGISLATION.  —  THE  THIR 
TEENTH  AMENDMENT.  —  REPEAL  OF  FUGITIVE 

ACTS.  —  RECONSTRUCTION   IN  LOUISIANA     197 


CHAPTER   XX. 
PERSONAL,  SOCIAL,  AND  INTELLECTUAL  CHARACTER- 


CHAPTER   XIX.  —  1865. 

CLOSE   OF  THE/ittTSfiASSINATION    OF    LINCOLN. 

^ON     .........    214 


22  1 


CHAPTER  XXI.  —  1865,  1866. 

RECONSTRUCTION.  —  Svwgg&.j&s-X^ESip&pz^'lQ&A- 

SON.  —  THE  FOURTEENTH  AMENDMENT  ....    235 

CHAPTER  XXII.  —  1866-1868. 

RECONSTRUCTION.  —  GENERAL  LEGISLATION.  —  ALASKA. 

—  FAMILY   CHANGES.  —  SUMNER'S   MARRIAGE     .    250 


xn  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER   XXIII.  —  1868. 

r\  PAGE 

THE    ItoPEAC^MENlffiF    PRlMIDENJ^jQHNSP'N        ...      265 

CHAPTER   XXIV.  —  1868-1870. 

THE  ELECTION  OF  GRANT.  —  LOUISIANA.  —  THE  FIF 
TEENTH  AMENDMENT.  —  SUMNER'S  FOURTH  ELEC 
TION  TO  SENATE  .............  273 


t         . 

iMNfik 
" 


CHAPTER  XXV.  —  1869-1871. 

AND  PRESIDENT  GRANT.  —  JOHNSON-CLAR- 
END"ON  TREATY.  -^$AN  Doijumo.-^"  ALABAMA" 
CLAIMS  ................  281 


CHAPTER  XXVI. 
SUMNER  AT  HOME      .............    301 

CHAPTER  XXVII.  —  1870-1872. 

CIVIL  RIGHTS  BILL.  —  LIBERAL  MOVEMENT.  —.SPEECH 
>A.GAINST_  (JRANT.  —  RE-ELECTION  OF  GRANT.  — 
TRIP  TO  EUROPE  .............  307 

CHAPTER  XXVIII.  —  1872-1874. 

CENSURE    BY   MASSACHUSETTS    LEGISLATURE.  —  ILL 

NESS.  —QUIET  LIFE      ...........    3!7 

CHAPTER  XXIX.  —  1874. 
DEATH  AND  BURIAL  .............    322 


INDEX 327 


OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


CHARLES  SUMNER. 


CHAPTER   I. 

ANCESTORS. 

IT  is  pre-eminently  true  of  Charles  Sumner  that 
"Character  is  the  key  to  facts."  Given  his  char 
acter,  and  the  facts  for  which  he  was  responsible  are 
the  necessary  and  orderly  result.  It  is  sometimes 
thought  still  too  early  justly  to  estimate  these  facts ; 
but  every  new  study  of  the  men  of  his  time,  however 
simple,  better  explains,  not  only  their  own  work,  but 
the  whole  remarkable  period  during  which  they  lived 
and  in  which  they  made  history  with  such  rapidity. 
Nay,  more,  if  it  be  true  that  "  the  character  of  indi 
viduals  in  the  crucial  moments  of  national  existence 
does  more  than  explain  history,  it  teaches  us  to  know 
the  race  to  which  they  belong,"  then  it  is  specially 
important  to  know  the  temper  of  those  high  souls 
who  lead  their  fellows.  We  may  make  our  own, 
words  written  of  an  Italian  patriot :  "  Of  the  char 
acter  and  individuality  of  the  man  who  purged  the 
name  of  his  country  from  being  a  reproach  among 
the  nations,  who  led  her  with  strong  and  loving  hands 
through  a  fiery  furnace  to  the  attainment  of  one 
earthly  good  more  precious  than  freedom,  —  the  de- 


2  CHARLES  SUMNER, 

serving  of  it,  —  it  seems  most  needful  to  speak."  It 
is  indeed  thus  needful  to  speak  of  Sumner,  for  already 
men  ask  what  he  did  in  his  day  that  succeeding  gen 
erations  should  praise  him.  Unlike  Lincoln,  Seward, 
Grant,  —  whose  deeds  live  after  them,  and  whose 
great  service  can  be  expressed  in  idiomatic  phrase, 
—  this  man's  work  is  hard  to  define,  harder  still  to 
measure.  But  it  is  only  a  cheap  and  easy  way  out  of 
the  difficulty,  a  sort  of  blind  thoroughfare  in  histori 
cal  criticism,  to  say  that  we  cannot  yet  determine  his 
place  in  history ;  for  in  truth  his  service  to  our  devel 
opment  is  not  hard  to  discover,  whatever  may  be 
thought  of  its  relative  value.  Intangible  and  evan 
escent  as  was  its  direct  result,  we  cannot  leave  Sum 
ner  out  of  account  in  considering  the  United  States  of 
his  day  or  of  ours. 

Charles  Sumner  has  been  called  "  the  most  typical 
Massachusetts  man,  having  the  most  of  the  Massachu 
setts  spirit,"  —  a  spirit  which,  born  among  the  Pil 
grims  and  Puritans,  bred  in  Boston  and  nursed  at 
Harvard,  joins  an  inexorable  moral  purpose  to  a  vivid 
patriotism  and  an  almost  supercilious  culture.  But 
whether  or  not  Sumner  was  the  most  typical  man  of 
his  native  commonwealth,  he  certainly  does  take  a 
representative  place  on  the  bede-roll  of  her  great  sons. 
And  on  a  wider  field  he  does  especially  and  grandly 
represent  the  Puritan  spirit  and  the  Pilgrim  idea,  and 
so  the  peculiar  ethical  and  political  idea  of  our  whole 
nation.  When  we  consider  Sumner's  ancestry,  we 
find  him  the  product  of  conditions  rarely  known 
since  the  world  began  outside  of  little  New  England. 
On  both  sides  he  came  of  a  family  of  plain  farmers, 


ANCESTORS.  3 

yet  none  the  less  they  held  frequent  and  honourable 
office  in  church  and  state,  and  moved  proudly  among 
their  fellows.  From  the  first  of  the  race  in  America, 
one  William  Sumner,  who  was  "  Selectman  "  of  Dor 
chester  in  1637  and  "  Deputy  to  the  General  Court "  of 
Massachusetts,  down  through  the  generations,  public 
office  and  civic  trust  hold  a  not  inconsiderable  place 
in  the  annals  of  these  plain  men  of  hard  hands  and 
small  wealth.  The  grandfather  of  Charles  Sumner, 
one  Job  Sumner,  was  alike  child  of  New  England 
and  man  of  the  world,  —  successively  a  common  farm 
labourer,  student  at  Harvard,  and  major  in  the  Conti 
nental  army,  until  at  thirty  he  became  a  commissioner 
under  the  new  government,  and  spent  five  years  of 
luxurious  ease  in  Georgia,  in  the  fashion  that  inclina 
tion  and  position  suggested,  and  only  rarely  visiting 
his  old  home.  He  died  in  New  York  city  in  1789, 
and  was  buried  there,  —  this  quondam  farmer's  boy, 
—  with  the  Vice-President  and  Secretary  of  War  and 
senators  and  representatives  of  his  own  state  for 
mourners,  and  eight  officers  of  the  late  war  to  carry 
the  pall,  while  a  regiment  of  artillery  and  the  Society 
of  the  Cincinnati  guarded  his  body  as  it  was  borne 
to  its  resting-place  in  St.  Paul's  churchyard. 

His  son,  Charles  Pinckney  Sumner  (the  father  of 
Charles  Sumner) ,  was  born  in  Massachusetts  and  edu 
cated  there.  He  also  lived  the  life  of  a  New  England 
boy,  somewhat  shadowed  in  his  case,  and  filled  with 
even  more  than  the  usual  rigour  of  discipline  and 
work.  Living  on  the  farm  of  the  parish  sexton,  for 
four  years  before  he  was  twelve  years  old  he  per 
formed  half  the  labour  of  a  man  from  sunrise  to  sun- 


4  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

set  all  the  summer  through,  getting  what  learning  he 
might  in  the  short  winter  at  the  district  school.  But 
whether  it  was  summer  or  winter,  he  added  to  his 
other  work  all  the  "chores  "  of  the  farm.  A  year  or 
two  before  his  death,  for  some  reason  the  redoubtable 
major  began  to  take  a  new  interest  in  his  son,  and  the 
boy  was  sent  to  school  at  Exeter,  followed  by  Chester^ 
fieldian  letters  from  the  father  on  manners  and  studies. 
There  was  some  trouble  about  remittances,  it  is  true, 
but  like  the  gallant  gentleman  he  was,  the  commissioner 
depended  upon  his  friends  to  make  good  any  defi 
ciencies,  and  the  young  Charles  went  on  acquiring 
"  eloquence  and  manners,  wisdom  and  the  languages," 
at  Phillips  Academy,  and  afterward  at  Harvard.  He 
further  filled  out  the  New  England  rdle  by  following 
his  college  course  with  a  term  or  two  of  teaching,  and 
then  studied  law  with  Josiah  Quincy.  Public  office 
and  civic  trust  had  much  attraction  for  this  Sumner 
also,  and  politics  shortly  superseded  the  law.  At 
twenty-eight  he  became  clerk  of  the  House  of  Repre 
sentatives,  his  intimate  friend  Joseph  Story  being  its 
Speaker.  And  here  again  we  meet  the  simple  habits 
of  New  England  joined  with  its  pride  of  birth  and 
intense  self-respect.  When  in  1810  Charles  Pinckney 
Sumner  married  Relief  Jacob,  it  was  of  small  account 
to  them  or  their  fellows  that  she  had  been  a  tailoress, 
earning  her  living  by  the  needle,  since  she  was  a 
woman  of  education,  and  equally  the  friend  and 
companion  of  her  employers.  These  things  are  not, 
outside  of  New  England,  and  more,  they  are  already 
of  the  past ;  but  in  the  Boston  of  that  time  it  was  no 
surprise  that  the  boy  who  cUd  chores  fpr  the  parish 


ANCESTORS.  5 

sexton  till  he  was  twelve  years  old  should  fill  the 
proud  office  of  High  Sheriff  of  Suffolk  County  for 
nearly  a  dozen  years ;  nor  was  there  any  incongruity 
between  the  past  and  the  present  when  the  sometime 
tailoress  received  as  her  guests  Chief-Justice  Shaw, 
Governor  Lincoln,  Josiah  Quincy,  Samuel  E.  Sewall, 
that  quintessence  of  aristocracy  Harrison  Gray  Otis, 
and  a  long  line  of  other  judges,  statesmen,  and  cler 
gymen,  who  frequented  her  house.  In  strict  accord 
ance  with  the  habits  of  his  own  thrifty  Yankee  land 
is  it  also  that  though  his  father  found  life  in  careless 
Georgia  too  much  for  his  purse,  High-Sheriff  Charles 
Pinckney  Sumner  generously  maintained  his  family  of 
nine  children,  and  kept  a  suitable  state  in  Boston, 
and  grew  passing  rich  on  three  thousand  a  year,  so 
that  when  he  died,  in  1839,  he  left  some  fifty  thou 
sand  dollars.  Those  who  refer  all  things  to  heredity 
and  environment  will  find  much  to  interest  them  in 
this  story  of  Charles  Sumner's  ancestry  and  home.  It 
is  noteworthy  that  his  father  was  considered  too  for 
mal  and  punctilious,  too  reserved  and  too  little  pliant 
to  the  ways  of  men,  to  please  the  general  public,  that 
he  had  "  a  grave  and  sombre  tone  of  mind,  and 
though  loyal  to  his  friends,  was  hardly  an  easy  ac 
quaintance."  An  almost  morbid  conscience  and  "  a 
fixedness  of  purpose  in  doing  his  duty  as  he  under 
stood  it,  no  matter  what  others  might  say  or  think," 
is  said  by  a  careful  observer  to  have  been  the  most 
prominent  trait  in  the  character  of  Charles  Pinckney 
Sumner.  It  is  interesting,  too,  to  know  that  he  made 
learned  and  elaborate  researches  into  the  history  of 
his  office,  transcribed  choice  extracts  from  English 


6  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

and  Latin  authors,  applied  historical  precedents  to 
current  events,  —  mental  habits  which  he  assiduously 
taught  to  his  sons.  He  engaged  warmly  in  the  vari 
ous  controversies  that  raged  about  him  over  questions 
half  political  and  all  moral  as  those  men  looked  at 
them,  —  the  Masonic  controversy,  the  Catholic  ques 
tion,  and  especially  slavery.  Of  the  last  evil  he  said, 
with  unconscious  prophecy,  "  Our  children's  heads  will 
some  day  be  broken  on  a  cannon-ball  on  this  ques 
tion."  He  had  no  sympathy  with  the  social  prejudice 
against  the  negro,  then  as  now  as  strong  in  the  North 
as  in  the  South,  while  by  word  and  deed  he  showed 
active  interest  in  maintaining  the  rights  then  every 
where  legally  denied  the  black  man,  but  sometimes 
practically  secured  to  him  by  men  of  Sheriff  Sumner's 
temper. 


EARLY  LIFE   AND  EDUCATION. 


CHAPTER   II. 
1811-1837. 

EARLY  LIFE  AND  EDUCATION. VISIT  TO  WASHINGTON. 

LAW   PRACTICE   IN   BOSTON. 

CHARLES  SUMNER  was  the  eldest  of  nine  children. 
He  and  his  twin  sister  Matilda  were  born  in  Boston 
on  the  6th  of  January,  1 8 1 1 .  The  family  showed 
much  of  the  mingled  simplicity  and  culture  and  the 
underlying  moral  earnestness  common  to  the  Sumner 
household  and  its  neighbours,  and  withal  possessed 
something  more  than  usual  of  attraction.  One  mem 
ber  after  another  died,  of  accident  or  disease,  till 
in  1866  only  Charles  and  his  youngest  sister  were 
left  of  the  whole  circle. 

Matilda  died  in  1832,  at  the  age  of  twenty-one, 
a  plain  but  sweet  and  kindly  woman,  who  had  con 
scientiously  filled  an  eldest  daughter's  busy  place  in 
life.  Of  the  five  brothers,  two  were  more  closely  asso 
ciated  with  Charles  than  the  others.  Albert's  house 
was  a  second  home  to  him  until  the  unhappy  ship 
wreck  in  1856  which  destroyed  that  brother  and  his 
whole  family ;  George  Sumner,  the  third  son,  he  found 
in  some  respects  the  most  congenial  companion  of  all 
the  family.  A  traveller  in  many  lands  and  a  student  of 
their  institutions  and  governments,  that  brilliant  man 


8  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

devoted  his  life  to  literature  and  learning.  He  made 
his  home  in  Paris,  with  occasional  seasons  of  public 
lectures  in  America,  but  died  in  Boston  in  1863, 
just  at  the  height  of  the  Senator's  career.  Three 
years  later  their  mother  followed  him,  leaving  her 
distinguished  son  practically  alone,  since  a  distant 
residence  had  long  separated  him  from  his  only  re 
maining  sister,  Mrs.  Hastings. 

Like  all  Boston  boys,  Charles  Sumner  owed  his 
early  education  to  the  famous  Latin  School,  where 
he  remained  until  he  was  fifteen.  At  that  mature 
age  the  future  champion  of  peace  made  an  attempt 
to  go  to  West  Point,  but  failing  in  the  effort,  entered 
Harvard  College  in  1826.  If  his  parentage  and 
home  life  had  much  to  do  with  the  man  he  after 
ward  became,  his  friendships  —  perhaps  his  father's 
friends  before  him  —  had  much  to  do  with  his  career 
all  his  life  long.  Some  of  the  men  that  gathered 
around  his  father's  table  are  almost  as  well  known 
to  us  as  to  their  contemporaries ;  and  among  his 
own  schoolmates  and  friends  we  find  many  a  name 
common  to  his  later  years.  Robert  C.  Winthrop, 
George  S.  Hillard,  James  Freeman  Clarke,  and  Wen 
dell  Phillips  were  all  his  schoolmates.  Josiah  Quincy 
was  the  President  of  Harvard  College,  and  one  of 
the  Channings  and  Ticknor  were  among  its  pro 
fessors.  He  had  many  connections  with  the  great 
world  too.  In  those  days  Daniel  Webster,  the  idol 
of  Massachusetts  and  the  chief  statesman  of  the  coun 
try,  was  a  familiar  presence  to  him ;  and  on  the  day 
the  boy  was  graduated  at  the  Latin  School,  no  less 
a  person  than  John  Quincy  Adams,  President  of 


EARLY  LIFE  AND  EDUCATION.  9 

the  United  States,  was  present  and  made  a  speech. 
Thus  early  was  he  thrown  into  a  very  nest  and  nur 
sery  of  greatness.  A  respectable  career  at  school, 
with  some  prizes,  was  followed  by  a  similar  course 
at  college.  Always  in  those  days  the  young  Sumner 
did  fairly  well  at  what  he  must,  and  took  extraordi 
nary  rank  wherever  he  would.  Tall  and  noticeably 
thin,  he  was  somewhat  awkward,  and  his  self-conscious 
ness  frequently  produced  a  certain  shyness.  He  was 
much  concerned  as  to  his  clothes,  and  affected  a 
cloak  of  blue  camel's  hair,  and  varied  the  prescribed 
costume  of  an  undergraduate  by  a  buff  waistcoat  of 
much  local  renown.  This  care  for  his  dress  and 
consciousness  of  the  effect  of  his  person  remained 
with  Mr.  Sumner  to  the  end  j  always  considering  the 
appointments  of  life  with  a  careful  regard,  clothes 
took  their  due  share  of  his  attention.  The  states 
man  was  no  less  careful  of  his  attire  than  the  college 
student;  and  the  young  lawyer  in  1837,  when  lec 
turing  upon  the  Constitution  to  a  coloured  literary 
society,  thought  it  fit  to  educate  them  in  other  direc 
tions  than  politics  by  the  moral  effect  of  a  fastidious 
regard  for  appearance,  as  expressed  by  certain  pearl- 
coloured  trousers  ! 

His  life  as  a  student  was  entirely  consistent  with 
his  whole  career.  We  have  no  wild-oats  period,  no 
sharp  corners,  but  a  regular  and  ordered  develop 
ment.  The  story  of  his  college  life  is  one  of  much 
study  and  little  recreation,  —  so  much  so  that  his 
chosen  biographer  deems  it  suitable  to  record  a  visit 
to  the  Brighton  cattle- fair.  He  had  a  half-dozen 
intimate  friends,  and  for  the  rest,  "  a  pleasant  word 


10  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

for  all"  sufficed  him.  Genial  and  amiable,  he  was 
fond  of  social  life  after  his  own  limited  definition 
jbf  the  word,  and  although  a  good  talker,  he  was  yet 
(somewhat  argumentative  and  a  trifle  pedantic.  Purity 
and  honour  were  as  dear  to  the  boy  as  to  the  man, 
and  even  profanity  was  impossible  to  him  then,  as 
in  after  life.  He  sometimes  said  he  had  never 
learned  the  "  Washington  vocabulary  "  !  He  was  a 
member  of  the  Hasty-Pudding  Club,  a  distinction 
which  says  much  for  his  personality ;  but  on  the 
other  hand,  his  comparatively  low  rank  as  a  scholar  is 
evidenced  by  his  failure  to  secure  the  purely  scholas 
tic  honour  of  an  election  to  Phi  Beta  Kappa,  given 
to  a  third  of  his  classmates.  The  curriculum  did  not 
greatly  attract  him,  and  he  devoted  himself  almost 
altogether  to  the  lighter  studies  which  in  one  way 
or  another  more  especially  concern  man  and  man's 
life,  —  to  "  the  humanities  and  the  arts,"  according 
to  one  of  his  fellow-students.  The  classics  made 
him  neglect  mathematics ;  he  preferred  belles-lettres 
to  such  science  as  fell  to  his  lot  in  those  pre-Dar- 
winian  times ;  he  chose  for  his  themes  heroes  and 
race  problems.  As  a  writer,  the  serious  point  of 
view  was  always  his,  and  the  style  was  heavy  —  too 
heavy  —  with  undigested  learning.  Neither  thorough 
nor  exact  in  his  knowledge,  its  scope  even  then  was 
extraordinary,  and  already  he  showed  that  phenom 
enal  ability  to  make  any  subject  his  own  in  a  very 
brief  time  which  was  his  peculiar  gift,  and  which 
both  accounted  for  and  occasioned  many  of  his 
characteristics  as  a  thinker  and  speaker. 

Sumner's  time  of  real  development  came  after  he 


EARLY  LIFE  AND  EDUCATION.  II 

left  college.  The  influences,  direct  and  indirect,  of 
his  life  at  the  Law  School,  and  the  memorable  Euro 
pean  journey  which  followed  it,  determined  the  quali 
ties  and  the  ambitions  that  were  equal  factors  of  his 
career.  He  did  not  at  once  begin  his  law  studies, 
the  chief  reason  for  his  delay  being  a  lack  of  defi 
nite  impulse  toward  any  profession.  Meanwhile,  that 
genius  of  general  learning  which  he  ever  worshipped 
claimed  his  eager  service.  He  scorned  delights  and 
lived  laborious  days,  eighteen  hours  long,  over  the 
ancient  and  modern  classics,  and  in  a  Spartan  devo 
tion  to  the  hated  and  hitherto  neglected  mathe 
matics.  He  tried  his  hand  at  school-teaching,  but 
speedily  gave  that  up,  to  his  own  entire  satisfaction. 
He  wrote  an  essay  on  Commerce,  which  gained  him 
much  reputation  and  a  copy  of  Lieber's  "  Encyclo 
paedia  Americana,"  awarded  by  Daniel  Webster; 
and  with  this  to  help  he  began  a  library,  and  laid 
in  those  selfsame  books  the  foundations  of  a  long 
and  valuable  friendship  with  their  author.  He  dis 
covered  thus  early  that  a  bookstore  is  an  earthly 
paradise,  and  he  began  that  habit  of  elaborate  corre 
spondence  which  lasted  all  his  life  through.  He 
devoted  much  of  his  time  to  hearing  lectures,  ora 
tions,  legal  arguments,  and  entered  warmly  into  the 
anti-Masonic  controversy  and  the  politics  of  the  day. 
But  all  these  most  interesting  and  helpful  pursuits 
did  not  advance  him  one  step  in  his  choice  of  a  pro 
fession.  In  truth,  he  was  greatly  ambitious,  and  no 
ordinary  career  attracted  him,  yet  no  path  appeared 
to  lead  to  the  heights  he  sought.  After  much  debate 
and  in  some  discouragement,  he  determined  at  last 


12  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

to  take  the  course  his  friends  had  long  urged,  and 
a  year  after  his  graduation  returned  to  Cambridge, 
a  student  at  the  Law  School.  He  did  not  mean 
to  confine  himself  to  the  law,  however.  As  he  him 
self  said,  at  a  later  date,  of  Pickering :  — 

"  He  knew  that  scholarship  would  gild  the  life  of  its 
professor,  would  afford  a  soothing  companionship  in 
hours  of  relaxation  from  labour,  in  periods  of  sadness,  and 
in  the  evening  of  life;  that  when  once  embraced,  it  was 
more  constant  than  friendship,  attending  its  votary  as  an 
invisible  spirit  in  the  toils  of  the  day,  the  watches  of  the 
night,  the  changes  of  travel,  and  the  alternations  of  for 
tune  and  health," 

To  this  end  the  student  just  come  to  his  majority 
proposed  to  read  forthwith  Shakspeare  and  the  Eng 
lish  poets,  to  dip  into  intellectual  philosophy  with 
Stewart,  and  political  economy  with  Say,  and  in  the 
way  of  classics  to  read  "Tacitus,  Lucretius,  VirgiJ, 
Ovid,  Sallust,  Cicero,  Horace,  Homer,  Thucydides, 
and  choice  plays  of  the  great  tragedians  "  ! 

Notwithstanding  this  characteristic  programme,  the 
chief  advantage  which  Sumner  gained  in  those  two 
years  came  neither  from  mental  culture  nor  profes 
sional  study,  but  from  the  personal  influence  of  the 
great  jurist,  Joseph  Story.  It  is  said  that  every  man's 
education  is  really  gained  from  a  single  teacher ;  and 
certainly  Charles  Sumner  is  a  conspicuous  example  of 
such  a  moulding  power.  Never  wont  to  be  largely 
influenced  by  those  about  him,  he  was  always  much 
affected  by  those  who  were  in  any  degree  his  heroes. 
Hence  when  he  came  to  know  for  himself,  as  friend 
and  favourite  pupil,  his  father's  old  friend  Judge  Story 


EARLY  LIFE  AND  EDUCATION1.  13 

—  when  the  boy  of  twenty-two  came  in  contact  with 
the  strong  personality  of  this  distinguished  lawyer  and 
great  man,  —  he  received  the  impulse  of  his  life.  Story 
added  to  the  weight  of  his  name  more  than  one  per 
sonal  trait  that  served  to  cement  the  friendship  be 
tween  teacher  and  disciple,  and  in  more  than  one 
direction  his  habits  of  mind  or  line  of  thought  fixed 
the  trend  for  the  student.  He  was  at  once  a  devoted 
lover  of  letters  and  a  deep  student  of  his  profession, 
and  withal  an  indefatigable  worker,  whose  "  heart 
embraced  labour  as  his  hand  grasped  the  hand  of  a 
friend,"  as  Sumner  said  of  him.  The  great  expounder 
of  our  Constitution,  it  was  his  habit,  to  quote  from  the 
pupil's  eloquent  tribute  to  his  memory,  "  to  unfold 
the  great  principles  drawn  from  experience  and  reflec 
tion,  from  the  rules  of  right  and  wrong,  from  the  un 
sounded  depths  of  Christian  truth,"  while  "  high  in 
his  mind  above  all  human  opinions  and  practices  were 
the  everlasting  rules  of  right." 

It  is  easy  to  trace  the  lines  of  his  influence.  Its 
extent  was  owing  partly  to  the  intense  admiration 
Sumner  felt  for  Judge  Story,  and  partly  to  the  fact 
that  he  was  himself  so  sympathetic  to  many  of  the 
mental  qualities  of  the  great  jurist ;  for  even  then  it 
was  true  of  him  that  he  could  not  understand  a  dif 
ferent  point  of  view  from  his  own,  or  even  show  him 
self  to  one  of  a  different  mould.  Thus  it  was  that 
Story  affected  him  so  strongly ;  and  much  urged  on  in 
the  same  direction  by  other  professors,  the  law  be 
came  Sumner' s  ambition.  He  had  planned  for  him 
self  a  brilliant  career  as  a  professor  of  literature  or 
history,  but  now  his  ambitions  changed,  and  he  would 


14  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

be  a  great  lawyer,  —  "a  jurist,  not  a  lawyer,"  as  he  puts 
the  fine  distinction.  Only  a  little  later,  these  same 
ambitions  changed  again,  and  other  influences  led  him 
to  wish  for  public  life  and  political  position,  until 
strangely  enough,  and  by  undreamed-of  ways,  he  fell 
into  that  place  and  fame  which  he  coveted. 

At  this  period,  however,  the  law  absorbed  him. 
"  Politics,"  he  says,  in  a  letter  to  a  friend,  "I  begin/ 
to  loathe  ;  they  are  of  a  day,  but  the  law  is  of  all 
time."  If  the  law  is  a  jealous  mistress,  she  certainly 
could  lay  no  complaint  at  his  door.  Early  and  late 
he  worked  at  his  studies,  denying  himself  recreation 
and  even  the  pleasures  of  friendship,  since  "  acquaint 
ances  eat  up  time  like  the  locust."  Time  was  his 
greatest  treasure ;  he  refers  to  its  value  more  than 
once  in  speech  and  correspondence,  and  he  used  it 
with  thrift.  He  devoted  forenoons  six  hours  long  to 
law,  his  afternoons  to  the  classics,  and  evenings,  which 
always  lasted  till  one  or  two  o'clock,  to  history  and 
general  literature.  His  great  physical  vitality  made 
possible  his  ambitions  into  whatever  direction  the 
mood  of  the  hour  turned  this  extraordinary  capacity 
for  work.  The  eagerness  which  he  had  spent  upon 
general  learning  he  turned  to  his  legal  studies  ;  but  an 
unerring  instinct  as  to  his  special  gifts  led  him  away 
from  the  methods  of  law  to  its  science,  from  its  practice 
to  its  principles.  His  ambition  to  become  a  "jurist," 
or  professor,  not  an  attorney,  directed  his  studies. 
His  marvellous  memory  both  helped  and  hindered 
him.  It  made  him,  as  one  of  his  classmates  predicted, 
a  "  vast  reservoir  of  law,  a  repertory  of  facts  to  which 
all  may  resort."  But  it  choked  any  early  growth  of 


EARLY  LIFE  AND  EDUCATION.  I5 

originality  or  creative  power  which  may  have  been 
hidden  under  this  piled-up  learning.  It  is  probable, 
however,  that  his  was  never  an  original  mind,  and  he 
was  but  following  out  the  law  of  his  being  in  providing 
himself  with  an  array  of  learning  which  did  indeed 
serve  him  as  an  efficient  substitute.  The  few  recrea 
tions  which  this  indefatigable  student  allowed  himself 
were  comprised  in  an  occasional  visit  to  the  theatre, 
—  unless,  indeed,  Fanny  Kemble  was  acting,  when  he 
became  a  devotee  of  the  play,  —  and  in  not  infrequent 
visits  to  the  families  of  Judge  Story  and  Judge  Green- 
leaf,  or  occasional  appearances  at  President  Quincy's 
receptions.  During  this  period  of  study  he  prepared 
a  catalogue  of  the  library  of  the  Law  School,  and 
published  a  number  of  articles  of  a  more  or  less  legal 
cast,  and  successfully  competed  for  one  or  two  prizes. 
"  It  popped  into  his  head  "  one  day,  we  learn  from 
one  of  his  published  letters,  that  he  would  throw  to 
gether  a  few  ideas  on  Commerce,  and  after  a  week 
of  this  hasty  work  he  gained  the  prize  of  the  Boston 
Society  for  the  Diffusion  of  Knowledge,  with  an  essay 
of  fifty  pages.  In  like  manner  he  determined  to  try 
for  the  Bowdoin  prize,  choosing  as  the  least  difficult  of 
the  subjects  given,  "Are  the  most  Important  Changes 
in  Society  effected  Gradually,  or  by  Violent  Revolu 
tions?  "  He  maintained  the  view  that  such  changes 
are  best  brought  about  by  gradual  means,  in  another 
long  essay,  written  in  a  fortnight's  leisure  from  his  other 
and  regular  duties.  But  it  is  by  no  means  to  be  taken 
for  granted  that  because  these  were  hasty  productions 
that  they  were  therefore  superficial.  The  already 
extraordinary  extent  of  Sumner's  reading,  —  made 


1 6  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

available  by  his  prodigious  memory,  —  added  to  a 
capacity  to  find  what  he  wanted  in  a  book,  amounting 
to  genius,  not  only  rendered  him  able  to  work  with  an 
unheard-of  rapidity,  but  also  made  it  natural  and  easy 
for  him  thus  to  produce  scholarly  work.  Whether  it 
was  also  the  work  of  a  scholar,  is  the  whole  question  of 
Sumner's  intellectual  rank. 

When  Sumner  exchanged  the  life  of  the  law  school 
for  that  of  the  law  office,  he  proved  true  to  his  ambi 
tion  in  associating  himself  with  Benjamin  Rand,  a 
lawyer  distinguished  more  for  his  learning  than  for  the 
extent  of  his  practice  ;  but  he  remained  there  only  a 
very  brief  time  before  establishing  an  office  of  his 
own.  Meanwhile,  however,  he  began  that  career  of 
social  success  which  was  no  less  remarkable  than  were 
his  intellectual  triumphs,  with  a  two  months'  trip  to 
Philadelphia  and  Washington.  He  had  largely  con 
quered  his  early  shyness,  and  the  stiffness  of  his  col 
lege  days  had  now  become  a  sort  of  reserve  which 
became  him  very  well.  A  certain  naive  simplicity  and 
directness  of  character,  with  a  combination  of  culture 
and  enthusiasm  somewhat  rare,  made  him  most  at 
tractive,  as  he  was  a  marked  man  in  any  company. 
He  was  withal  a  charming  talker,  although  his  insati 
able  craving  for  knowledge  sometimes  interfered  with 
his  entire  success  in  conversation.  Altogether,  the 
brilliant  society  of  Philadelphia  found  him  a  most 
available  and  satisfactory  lion.  In  Washington  his 
personal  attractions  gave  him  his  own  place  in  the 
distinguished  circle  opened  to  him  by  the  friendship 
of  Justice  Story,  so  that  the  young  man  of  twenty- 
three  counted  as  friends  such  men  as  Francis  Lieber, 


LAW  PRACTICE  IN  BOSTON.  17 

Chancellor  Kent,  Chief-Justice  Marshall,  Choate, 
Clay,  Calhoun,  Webster.  This  journey  is  worth 
remark  for  a  double  reason.  It  was  the  first  figure 
in  a  social  combination  which  unlocks  many  of 
the  experiences  of  the  statesman,  —  for  personal 
friendship  was  the  real  secret  of  the  situation 
nine  times  out  of  ten,  personal  knowledge  the 
ground  of  much  action ;  and  it  was  a  memorable 
journey  also,  because  it  introduced  Sumner  to  Wash 
ington,  and  was  his  first  glimpse  of  those  political 
circles  afterward  his  own  familiar  place. 

As  yet  they  had  no  solid  attraction  for  him,  but  only 
a  sort  of  fascination,  and  he  returned  to  Boston  to 
begin  the  practice  of  his  profession  in  earnest.  His 
office  was  the  resort  of  a  goodly  company.  George 
S.  Hillard  was  his  partner.  They  had  for  neighbours 
Chandler,  Choate,  and  Horace  Mann,  and  there  came 
familiarly,  great  judges  like  Story,  or  brilliant  writers 
like  Bancroft.  But  clients  were  harder  to  find  than 
friends.  It  is  possible  that  the  ordinary  jury  was  not 
much  moved  by  old  law  or  historic  allusion,  and  that 
Sumner's  reputation  for  learning  commended  him 
more  to  editors  and  professors  than  to  the  public.  He 
was  not  without  cases,  but  his  practice  was  small  and 
unimportant.  His  time  was  no  more  his  own  than 
before,  however.  Legal  articles  continued  to  flow 
from  his  pen,  and  he  edited  a  law  review,  while  in 
company  with  Professor  Greenleaf,  or  on  his  own 
account,  he  prepared  several  law-books.  He  lectured 
at  the  Law  School  —  then  "  flourishing  beyond  a  par 
allel  "  with  fifty  students  —  for  three  months  of  the 
year,  filling  as  best  he  might  the  place  of  Story  him- 


1 8  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

self.  He  was  made  Commissioner  of  the  United 
States  Court,  and  Reporter  as  well ;  and  to  fill  any 
unoccupied  time  he  frequently  lectured  in  popular 
courses,  although  his  subjects  had  usually  some  pro 
fessional  bearing.  By  no  means  an  orator,  avoiding 
rather  than  seeking  the  political  honours  which  fre 
quently  fell  to  the  lot  of  his  associates,  as  yet  with 
only  the  most  general  interest  in  the  slavery  question, 
it  would  seem  at  first  that  he  gave  little  promise  of 
either  the  nature  or  the  quality  of  his  future  fame. 
But  longer  thought  reveals  the  promise  of  his  later 
life,  waiting  only  its  potency  to  spring  into  vigorous 
being.  His  great  learning  and  wide  acquaintance  — 
the  right  and  left  hand  of  all  his  work  —  were  already 
more  than  begun.  His  enormous  capacity  for  taking 
pains  was  already  well  trained  to  do  his  bidding  with 
out  haste  or  without  rest.  Moreover,  he  had  found 
what  he  would  not  or  could  not  do.  He  had  ceased 
to  wish  for  literary  success  alone,  and  he  had  found 
he  could  not  reach  his  great  ambition  by  the  ordinary 
practice  of  the  law.  The  ambition  remained,  the 
equipment  was  ample :  what  then  was  wanting  ? 
Chiefly  a  motive,  and  therewith  (ancL^^s  its  con 
sequence)  a  definite  trend  of  action.  V* 'For  just  as 
truly  as  ambition  and  love  of  power  wereHh^'inspiring 
forces  of  this  life,  and  learning  and  friendship  were  its 
tools,  just  so  certainly  was  moral  enthusiasm  its 
motive,  not  only  vitalizing  the  rest,  but  co-ordinating 
them  into  a  whole.  It  is  true  that  these  elements 
were  differently  combined  as  the  years  went  on  :  some 
times  one  set  of  qualities  was  dominant,  and  again 
another ;  but  in  just  so  far  as  the  moral  idea  ruled 


LAW  PRACTICE  IN  BOSTON.  19 

him,  just  so  far  he  was  great,  and  greatly  did  his 
work.  The  legal  essayist  was  no  special  favourite  on 
the  platform,  but  the  young  anti-slavery  orator  was,  it 
was  said,  "  like  Ithuriel  with  his  spear,"  till  contem 
poraries  could  find  no  words  for  their  admiration. 
The  day  of  inspiration  had  not  yet  come ;  for  the 
present,  learning  and  professional  and  personal  am 
bition  were  the  motives  which  most  affected  him. 
There  was  still  only  the  promise  of  greatness.  Forty 
years  later,  the  same  rule  held  true ;  then  love  of 
power  took  the  first  place  with  him,  and  became  the 
impelling  motive,  demanding  control  instead  of  in 
fluence  :  the  moral  motive  was  largely  superseded, 
and  in  consequence  greatness  became  a  thing  of  the 
past.  It  was  only  the  middle  period  of  Sumner's  life 
which  was  really  great.  In  the  first  years  it  was  a 
splendid  promise,  in  the  last  years  a  magnificent 
memory;  but  its  real  grandeur  was  in  that  middle 
time  when  attainments  and  temperament  and  charac 
ter,  learning  and  power,  —  all  that  he  was  and  might 
be, — were  gathered  together  in  the  grasp  of  a  great 
motive  and  fused  to  a  white  heat  by  a  great  moral 
enthusiasm.  I  Many  things  began,  however,  in  this 
the  time-tJfwaiting,  for  it  was  hardly  more.  Most 
of  them  entered  into  his  life,  as  the  greater  part  of 
his  interests  always  did,  by  the  door  of  personal 
friendship.  Dr.  William  E.  Channing  became  one  of 
his  heroes,  and  influenced  the  deeper  part  of  his 
nature  much  as  Judge  Story  had  done  his  intellect  and 
character  a  little  earlier.  To  this  high  and  fine  and 
strong  inspiration  the  world  owes  a  side  of  Mr.  Sum- 
ner  not  altogether  natural  to  him,  and  of  which  there 


20  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

was  ever  too  little,  but  furnishing  that  vitality  to  his 
moral  nature  which  enabled  it  to  endure  unto  the  end. 
Doubtless  it  was  this  influence,  too,  which  prepared  the 
way  and  unconsciously  set  his  face  toward  the  strait 
path  of  the  reformer.  * 

At  this  period  began  also  a  certain  grouping  of 
friends  greatly  important  to  Sumner's  whole  life  af 
terward.  Felton,  the  Greek  scholar,  the  poet  Long 
fellow,  George  S.  Hillard,  lawyer  and  man  of  letters, 
Cleveland,  the  student  of  literature,  and  Sumner 
founded  a  social  club,  meeting  on  Saturdays,  where 
the  talk  ranged  over  the  whole  field  of  literature 
and  belles-lettres.  From  that  time  on,  Sumner  found 
in  one  or  the  other  of  these  men  that  sympathy 
which  no  man  can  live  without.  Longfellow  be 
came  his  closest  friend,  and  to  him  Sumner  always 
showed  a  side  of  his  nature  closed  to  the  outside 
world.  At  the  Cambridge  fireside  he  talked  with  a 
freedom  unfelt  elsewhere,  and  there  he  sought  sym 
pathy  or  listened  to  advice.  There,  too,  he  opened 
those  too  often  hidden  chambers  of  his  personality ; 
there  he  was  domestic  and  affectionate,  simple  and 
loving,  gay  or  sad ;  there  he  trifled  or  was  serious. 
Another  of  his  dear  friends  was  Dr.  Samuel  G.  Howe, 
—  a  friendship  second  only  to  that  with  Longfellow. 
It  turned  the  young  man's  attention  to  philanthropy, 
embarking  him  directly  on  the  turbulent  waters  of 
the  prison-discipline  controversy,  and  beginning  that 
interest  in  peace  questions  which  never  left  him. 
Horace  Mann  gave  him  still  another  impulse  toward 
the  moral  side  of  public  questions.  Many  a  friend 
ship  or  social  circle  of  those  years  explains  the  pos- 


LAW  PRACTICE  IN  BOSTON.  21 

sibility  or  the  reason  of  action  taken  long  years 
afterward.  At  every  turn  he  met  or  dined  or  visited 
with  some  man  or  woman  who  was  already  famous, 
or  who  became  a  power  in  the  great  controversy 
where  Sumner  did  his  work;  and  so  by  his  own 
knowledge  of  the  individual  behind  the  words,  he 
was  often  enabled  to  interpret  and  duly  weigh  both 
speech  and  deed. 


22  CHARLES  SUMNER. 


CHAPTER    III. 

1837-1840. 

EUROPEAN   JOURNEY. 

IN  these  days  of  constant  international  travel  it  seems 
sadly  out  of  proportion  to  devote  a  chapter  of  a 
great  man's  life  to  a  single  European  trip ;  but  this 
journey  bears  an  exaggerated  importance  in  that  life. 
If  you  ask  Mr.  Sumner's  contemporaries  for  the  se 
cret  of  his  fame,  they  begin  at  once  to  speak  of  this 
journey.  If  you  seek  the  source  of  much  of  his 
knowledge  of  men  and  affairs,  you  find  it  in  those 
three  years,  and  it  often  furnishes  the  explanation  of 
things  otherwise  contradictory.  It  is  astonishing  how 
often  the  world  at  large  dwells  upon  it  in  estimating  the 
man.  In  December,  1837,  Sumner  sailed  for  Havre. 
It  was  necessary  for  liirn  tomorrow  the  five  thousand 
dollars  he  spent  upon  this  tour,  —  money  afterward 
repaid  by  his  mother  from  the  estate,  —  and  he  went 
against  the  advice  of  his  most  valued  friends.  Judge 
Story  felt  that  this  was  the  end  of  the  law  for  Sumner, 
and  President  Quincy  contemptuously  remarked  that 
Europe  would  only  send  him  home  with  a  cane  and  a 
mustache.  But  the  determination  to  go  at  any  cost, 
and  in  face  of  all  obstacles,  only  marked  his  character 
istic  sense  of  his  own  value,  and  his  consequent  invari- 


EUROPEAN  JOURNEY.  23 

able  habit  of  considering  everything  around  him  in 
its  relation  to  himself,  —  a  characteristic  sometimes 
thought  the  inevitable  accompaniment  of  genius. 

A  glance  backward  will  place  him  before  us  more 
distinctly.  Though  only  twenty-six  years  of  age,  he 
was  the  editor  of  several  law-books,  and  for  some 
years  he  had  conducted  a  legal  review.  He  was  not 
only  a  professor  at  the  Law  School  of  Harvard  Uni 
versity,  but  more  than  once  he  had  taken  the  whole 
responsibility  of  that  department,  filling  not  unac- 
ceptably  the  place  of  Judge  Story.  Thus  he  was 
already  an  authority  in  his  chosen  profession,  espe 
cially  in  the  deeper  lines  of  its  science.  As  a  student 
of  letters  his  reputation  was  justly  great,  and  ranged 
over  the  whole  field  of  ancient  and  modern  litera 
ture,  and  the  list  of  his  attainments  or  the  catalogue 
of  his  reading  was  perhaps  unparalleled.  A  charac 
ter  of  firm  mould  and  high  ideals,  his  temperament 
gave  him  an  immense  confidence  in  himself,  and  a 
lack  of  imagination  and  sympathy  helped  to  preserve 
this  trait.  A  striking  and  handsome  physique,  a  care 
ful  devotion  to  the  exteriors  of  life,  a  great  personal 
charm,  with  that  quality  best  known  as  distinction, 
and  an  enthusiasm  that  pervaded  all  his  actions,  — 
these  made  up  a  truly  attractive  whole.  His  social 
experience  never  had  been  large.  Wherever  this 
young  man  had  touched  the  outside  world  he  had,  it 
is  true,  opened  the  door  into  its  chief  circles,  and 
beside  his  professional  achievements  and  his  learning 
must  be  placed  a  list  of  acquaintances  among  the 
great  men  of  his  own  country  extraordinary  for  one 
of  his  age ;  yet  it  was  true  that  his  own  circle  of 


24  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

friends,  if  fit,  was  still  few,  and  in  Boston,  though  vis 
iting  in  families  since  widely  known,  his  circle  was 
very  small.  Out  of  this  limited  and  highly  provincial 
life  he  sprang  at  a  bound  into  the  midst  of  the  great 
world.  He  was  right  in  desiring  a  wider  atmosphere. 
Europe  was  like  air  and  sunshine  to  the  vigorous 
plant.  He  went  away  a  brilliant  young  student 
anxious  for  professional  renown  ;  he  came  back  in 
three  years  a  man  of  the  world,  eager  to  show  that  he 
was  one  among  that  splendid  fellowship,  and  deter 
mined  to  make  his  own  place  therein.^  Standards  and 
aims  had  alike  changed ;  and  a  new  paradise  had 
opened  before  him,  justifying  the  prophecy  of  those 
who  knew  him  best,  that  the  law  could  no  longer 
hold  him,  But  if  Mr.  Sumner  learned  much  from 
Europe,  it  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  Europe  learned 
much  from  him.  Believing  us  to  be  a  nation  of 
shopkeepers,  she  found  this  American  a  young  man 
of  phenomenal  culture.  Supposing  that  all  New 
Englanders  were  coarse  in  habits  and  essentially 
bourgeois,  she  met  a  brilliant  young  man  of  fashion, 
faultless  in  his  appointments,  and  somewhat  too  pe 
dantic.  A  Yankee  in  all  his  blood  and  breeding, 
he  forced  her  to  a  new  definition  of  that  term ; 
and  every  inch  an  American,  he  compelled  respect 
for  the  country  which  had  produced  such  a  man. 
Never  was  a  single  journey  of  an  unknown  young 
man  more  fruitful.  His  purpose  differed  from  that 
of  an  ordinary  tourist.  Says  Edward  L.  Peirce  :  "  He 
desired  to  see  society  in  all  its  forms,  to  converse 
with  men  of  all  characters  and  representatives  of  all 
professions,  to  study  institutions  and  laws,  and  to 


EUROPEAN  JOURNEY.  25 

acquaint  himself  with  courts  and  parliaments.  He 
had  read  many  books,  and  wished  to  see  the  men  who 
wrote  them,  and  the  men  whose  deeds  they  commem 
orated.  He  had  read  foreign  law,  and  he  aspired  to 
comprehend  fully  its  doctrine  and  spirit  by  attending 
its  schools  and  observing  its  administration,  with  the 
view  of  using  such  knowledge  in  efforts  to  improve 
our  own."  Thus  did  the  Divinity  which  ever  shapes 
our  ends  bring  about  a  special  equipment  for  the 
career  which  Sumner  himself  had  not  even  imagined. 
The  knowledge  of  institutions  and  parliaments  and 
foreign  laws  now  gained  served  his  own  nation  well ; 
and  the  personal  acquaintance  with  men  of  all  char 
acters  and  representatives  of  all  professions  now  be 
gun  became  in  after  years  a  potent  factor  in  many  an 
international  question  of  vital  importance. 

The  first  six  months  were  spent  in  Paris,  at  least 
half  of  that  time  being  devoted  to  acquiring  the  lan 
guage,  but  the  chief  objects  of  the  journey  were  by 
no  means  forgotten.  Lectures  on  every  department 
of  law  were  varied  by  lectures  on  every  department 
of  literature.  The  list  of  professors  in  Sumner's 
diary  might  furnish  a  catalogue  of  the  Sorbonne  in  the 
spring  of  1838,  and  visits  to  hospitals,  churches, 
theatres,  and  salons  were  thickly  distributed  among 
his  sterner  studies,  while  he  gave  particular  attention 
to  the  methods  of  the  courts  of  law,  and  spent  much 
time  in  observation  and  study  of  the  government. 
Aside  from  the  more  purely  professional  results  of 
these  months,  the  wide  and  varied  circle  of  his  ac 
quaintance  may  be  discovered  by  a  dozen  names 
taken  at  random  from  the  long  descriptions  of  his  let- 


26  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

ters  and  journals,  and  selected  as  much  for  their  va 
riety  as  for  their  eminence.  De  Tocqueville,  Cousin, 
Ledru,  Constant,  Chevallier,  De  Metz,  Sismondi,  the 
Countess  Guiccioli,  Madame  Murat,  mark  certainly 
a  most  unusual  range  of  society. 

Notwithstanding  all  the  delights  of  Paris,  England 
was  the  Mecca  of  Sumner's  hopes.  He  says,  — 

"  There  indeed  I  shall  pluck  the  life  of  life.  .  .  .  The 
page  of  English  history  is  a  familiar  story;  the  English 
lav/  has  been  my  devoted  pursuit  for  years,  English  poli 
tics  my  pastime.  I  shall  then  at  once  leap  to  the  full  en 
joyment  of  all  the  mighty  interests  which  England  affords. 
Here,  then,  is  a  pleasure  which  is  great  almost  beyond 
comparison,  —  greater  to  my  mind  than  almost  everything 
else  on  earth,  except  the  consciousness  of  doing  good; 
greater  than  wealth  and  all  the  enjoyment  which  it 
brings." 

His  year  in  England  more  than  repaid  these  extrava 
gant  anticipations.  According  to  an  English  writer  : 

"Within  a  few  days  he  became  the  favoured  guest, 
and  ere  long  the  friend  of  men  of  law  and  men  of  letters, 
of  judges  and  of  statesmen,  of  country  gentlemen  and  of 
women  of  the  world,  in  the  most  brilliant  year  of  the  most 
brilliant  society  which  London  has  known  in  the  present 
century." 

A  whole  month  was  spent  in  following  the  circuit 
in  company  with  the  English  judges.  Says  the  au 
thority  already  quoted,  — 

"Never,  perhaps,  was  the  bench  of  justice  filled  by 
more  men  of  mark  and  power.  Lynd hurst  and  Brougham 
sat  in  the  House  of  Lords  beside  Lord  Chancellor  Cot- 
tenhain,  whose  merits  as  an  equity  judge  were  not  con- 


EUROPEAN  JOURNEY.  27 

tested.  Lord  Denham  presided  with  consummate  dignity 
in  the  Court  of  Queen's  Bench;  Tindal  in  the  Court  of 
Common  Pleas ;  Lord  Abinger  in  the  Exchequer,  —  a 
court  which  was  also  strengthened  by  the  vigorous  intel 
lect  of  Baron  Parke  ;  Lord  Langdale  sat  at  the  Rolls ; 
Campbell  and  Rolfe  were  the  law  officers  of  the  Crown. 
Follett,  Pemberton,  Pollock,  Thesiger,  Kelly,  Charles 
Austin,  James  Wigram,  Knight  Bruce,  and  others,  their 
rivals,  might  be  heard  in  a  single  cause.  Bethell  and 
Cockburn  brought  up  the  rear." 

Of  his  social  experiences  Sumner  himself  said,  in  a 
letter  to  Judge  Story,  that  in  England,  Scotland,  and 
Ireland  alike  he  "  visited  many  —  perhaps  I  may  say 
most  —  of  the  distinguished  men  of  these  glorious 
countries  at  their  seats,  and  have  seen  English  country 
life,  which  is  the  height  of  refined  luxury,  in  some  of 
its  most  splendid  phases."  London  was  an  even 
greater  success.  "  This  London  is  socially  a  bewitch 
ing  place,"  he  says;  and  well  he  might.  There  is 
no  limit  to  the  attentions  he  receives.  At  Victoria's 
coronation  he  is  given  a  double  supply  of  the  coveted 
tickets,  and  chooses  between  places.  At  the  House 
of  Lords  he  has  a  "  place  always  assigned  him  on  the 
steps  of  the  throne,  in  the  very  centre  of  the  house," 
where  he  remains  even  during  divisions ;  he  enjoys  a 
grand  ball  at  Lord  Fitzwilliam's  town-house  till  four 
o'clock  in  the  morning,  and  makes  a  night  of  it 
Christmas  night  at  the  country-seat  of  the  same 
nobleman.  For  want  of  days  enough,  he  declines  as 
many  invitations  to  breakfast  and  dinner  as  he  ac 
cepts  ;  and  it  was  said  of  him  that  "  his  popularity  in 
society  became  justly  so  great  and  so  general  that  his 


28  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

friends  began  to  devise  what  circle  there  was  to  show 
him  which  he  had  not  yet  seen,  what  great  house  he 
had  not  yet  visited."  For  months  he  has  no  time  to 
see  the  sights,  because  "  his  days  and  nights  are  given 
up  to  society,  men,  courts,  and  parliaments."  The 
variety  of  his  acquaintances  is  infinite,  and  his  very 
full  letters  to  his  friends  constitute  a  picture  of  Eng 
lish  social  life  of  that  period  in  its  most  attractive 
phase.  He  everywhere  encounters  his  friends  the 
justices ;  he  meets  at  a  single  dinner  Hallam,  Whew- 
ell,  Babbage,  Lyell,  Murchison,  Buckland,  Sedgwick. 
He  takes  wine  with  the  Bishop  of  London,  and  sits 
in  front  of  Louis  Napoleon  at  the  opening  of  Par 
liament.  His  four  days  at  Oxford  are  all  bespoken 
beforehand,  and  at  Cambridge  he  dines  first  with 
Whewell,  and  afterward  with  the  young  Lord  Napier, 
beginning  a  friendship  which  was  continued  in  Wash 
ington  in  1858.  He  spends  the  day  at  Windsor,  the 
guest  of  the  household,  and  goes  with  Sir  Frederick 
Pollock  to  the  Lord  Mayor's  banquet  in  Guildhall. 
He  is  "put  up"  at  four  clubs,  —  the  Athenaeum,  the 
Travellers',  Garrick's,  and  Alford's.  He  drives  with 
one  great  lord  after  another,  and  he  is  a  welcome 
guest  in  the  brilliant  literary  circles  where  Samuel 
Rogers  still  reigned,  where  Macaulay  still  talked. 
He  listens  to  Talfourd's  stories,  and  he  caps  Greek 
epigrams  or  Latin  verses  with  Brougham.  With 
Brougham,  too,  he  discusses  household  decoration,  or 
cooking,  or  English  politics,  as  the  case  may  be,  and 
he  weighs  the  words  of  that  statesman  against  those 
of  Lord  Durham.  He  meets  the  beautiful  Mrs.  Nor 
ton  one  day,  and  the  next  he  spends  the  evening  on 


EUROPEAN  JOURNEY.  29 

Mrs.  Shelley's  sofa.  Joanna  Baillie  and  Harriet  Mar- 
tineau  are  equally  his  friends.  He  goes  to  Chelsea 
to  meet  Leigh  Hunt  at  Carlyle's,  and  he  takes  tea 
with  Wordsworth  in  the  Lake  country.  He  is  "  for 
tunate  in  knowing  at  their  hearths  the  three  great  men 
of  the  '  Edinburgh  Review/  —  Smith,  Brougham,  and 
Jeffrey."  He  discusses  history  with  Hallam,  he  knows 
Browning  as  the  author  of  "  Paracelsus,"  and  Landor 
is  his  friend.  The  last  act  in  the  social  drama  is  a 
dinner  at  Holland  House. 

It  is  worthy  of  note  that  the  motive  of  Sumner's 
foreign  travel  was  to  an  extraordinary  degree  "  a  pas 
sionate  desire  to  see  and  know  the  wise  and  good  and 
great  men  of  other  countries,"  and  it  was  remarked 
by  his  friends  that  there  was  no  trace  of  what  is  called 
"  fashionable  life  "  in  any  of  his  letters.  Indeed, 
these  letters  furnish  an  unconscious  revelation  of  great 
interest ;  their  whole  story  is  a  story  of  intellectual 
pleasure,  of  men,  not  things.  Even  their  interest  in 
the  great  masterpieces  of  art  was  historical  or  literary, 
not  artistic.  In  one  sense  the  most  valuable  result  of 
these  experiences  was  his  personal  acquaintance  with 
young  men  whose  names  were  not  yet  known  to  the 
political  world,  but  who,  keeping  company  pari  passu 
with  the  young  American,  became,  like  him,  national 
leaders.  It  is  not  extravagant  to  say  that  the  nation 
was  sometimes  indebted  to  these  and  other  friend 
ships.  Who  shall  estimate,  for  instance,  the  value 
and  extent  of  the  influence  of  the  Duchess  of  Suther 
land,  Sumner's  dear  friend?  As  Mistress  of  the 
Robes,  it  is  not  easy  to  measure  the  effect  produced 
by  her  stanch  opposition  to  slavery  in  a  time  when 


30  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

the  chief  reliance  of  the  United  States  in  England 
was  the  influence  of  the  Throne.  If  Simmer's  phe 
nomenal  experience  be  marvelled  at,  it  must  be  re 
membered  that  brilliant  and  accomplished  Americans 
were  by  no  means  common  visitors  to  Europe  in  those 
days.  This  young  man  was,  in  the  estimation  of  one 
of  his  friends,  "  the  most  attractive  young  man  he  had 
ever  known ;  "  and,  moreover,  he  had  a  certain  con 
servatism  specially  attractive  to  his  hosts.  His  pro 
found  admiration  for  everything  English  won  golden 
opinions  as  to  his  standards  of  judgment  and  taste ; 
but  the  chief  secret  lay  in  this  conservatism  and  in 
mental  traits  more  nearly  English  than  American, 
which  immediately  established  a  bond  of  sympathy. 
It  was  this  stay  in  England  that  settled  the  course  of 
Sumner's  life.  He  still  thought  himself  to  be  looking 
forward  to  a  legal  career.  While  in  Paris  he  was  con 
templating  a  philosophical  treatise  on  law,  and  as  late 
as  1839  Judge  Story  was  planning  to  leave  the  Law 
School  in  his  hands,  —  doubtless  his  own  ambition ; 
but  insensibly  to  himself  his  ideas  were  changing.  As 
has  been  well  said,  "  During  his  stay  in  England,  Sum- 
ner  enjoyed  a  rare  opportunity  of  observing  closely  the 
men  of  that  day  who  had  been  distinguished  in  parlia 
ment  or  in  the  cabinet.  Their  broad  culture,  their 
delight  in  classical  studies,  their  large  knowledge  of 
history  and  international  law,  their  high-bred  cour 
tesy  and  finished  address  in  debate,  improved  his 
imagination  and  shaped  his  ideal  of  a  statesman." 
The  delights  of  a  life  of  action  seized  upon  him, 
and  that  subtle  fascination  exercised  by  political  life 
and  the  control  of  government  took  possession  of 


EUROPEAN  JOURNEY.  31 

him,  never  to  let  go.  The  waiting  ambition  took 
form  at  last,  though  slumbering  still.  To  be  a  states 
man  was  a  more  delightful  road  to  a  higher  success 
than  any  the  law  afforded.  His  world  was  a  new 

Frld,  his  desire  a  new  place  in  it. 
When  Sumner  left  England  in  March,  1839,  he 
went  first  to  Paris  for  a  month,  —  where  his  new  in 
terests  appeared  in  an  elaborate  paper  defending  the 
position  of  the  United  States  in  the  Northeastern 
boundary  question,  —  and  thence  to  Italy  for  the  sum 
mer.*  While  the  thronging  associations  of  that  home 
of  history  had  their  special  charm  for  him,  and  he 
feasted  on  her  bays  and  her  mountains,  her  ruins  of 
every  age,  her  architecture  and  her  art,  it  was  not  to 
these  that  he  turned  first  and  chiefly.  The  language 
and  the  literature  of  Italy  were  what  most  attracted 
him ;  and  no  better  illustration  of  his  method  of  at 
tacking  a  subject,  or  his  unparalleled  power  of  work, 
can  be  found  than  the  manner  in  which  he  spent  his 
time  in  Rome.  For  three  months  he  rose  at  half-past 
six,  and  worked  till  six  at  night,  after  which  he  visited 
the  sights  of  the  Eternal  City  ;|and  during  this  time  he 
read  in  the  original,  Dante,  lasso's  "  Gerusalemme," 
the  "Decameron"  of  Boccaccio,  the  "Rime"  of  Po- 
litian,  all  the  tragedies  of  Alfieri,  the  principal  dramas 
of  Metastasio,  —  some  six  volumes,  —  the  "  Storia  Pit- 
torica  "  of  Lanzi,  the  "  Principe  "  of  Machiavelli,  the 
"  Aminta  "  of  Tasso,  the  "  Pastor  Fido  "  of  Guarini, 
and  much  of  a  half-dozen  other  famous  or  little  known 
authors.  Nor  was  this  enough.  Before  he  left  Italy 
he  read  other  works  of  these  authors,  and  much  more 
of  poetry,  the  drama,  history,  and  purely  professional 


32  CHARLES  SUMMER. 

works.  He  spent  at  least  six  hours  a  day  in  study 
while  travelling,  since  the  country  was  sometimes  dull, 
—  a  method  of  enjoyment,  it  may  be  said,  which  he 
never  altogether  laid  aside.  In  Washington  he  would 
frequently  prepare  for  a  drive  by  stuffing  his  pockets 
full  of  books,  which  he  read  steadily  until  he  returned*. 
In  Italy  he  found  much  occasion  for  another  favourite 
habit,  —  that  of  taking  down  all  the  books  in  a  library 
and  reading  their  titles,  by  which  means  he  learned 
at  least  where  to  find  the  information  he  wanted; 
and  it  was  his  custom  at  this  time  to  read  ten  news 
papers  a  day,  —  all  he  could  find  of  the  journals  of 
America,  England,  France,  Spain,  and  Italy.  It  was 
said  of  Sumner  by  one  of  the  friends  he  first  met  in 
Rome,  but  afterward  grappled  to  his  soul  with  hooks 
of  steel,  Prof.  George  W.  Greene,  "  Knowledge  he 
appeared  to  seek  for  its  own  sake  and  as  a  means 
of  usefulness."  For  its  own  sake,  evidently ;  but  for 
the  rest  it  is  more  probable  that  he  sought  knowledge 
not  so  much  as  a  means  of  usefulness,  as  that  he 
might  use  it.  To  him  a  book  was  a  weapon,  and  a 
library  an  armoury  of  weapons  the  kind  and  manner 
of  which  it  was  well  to  know,  that  he  might  be  pre 
pared  for  any  contingency.  The  desire  to  fight  for 
an  end  had  not  yet  arisen  within  him,  but  only  the 
desire  to  become  great  by  fighting. 

The  last  winter  of  his  foreign  tour  was  spent  in 
Germany,  where  he  again  sought  the  special  pleasure 
of  men  and  society;  but  as  befitted  the  genius  of 
that  country,  his  friends  here  were  among  her  learned 
men,  —  Raumer,  Ranke,  Humboldt,  and  the  great 
doctors  of  law,  Savigny  and  Thibaut ;  though  he 


EUROPEAN  JOURNEY.  33 

received  special  attentions  from  the  court  and  Wil 
liam  I.,  then  only  a  prince,  and  from  Prince  Metter- 
nich  j  and  he  kept  up  his  prodigious  study  of  language 
and  literature.  This  was  practically  the  end  of  Eu 
rope.  A  few  more  weeks  in  England,  and  he  bade 
a  reluctant  good- by  to  the  scenes  of  his  studies 
and  his  triumphs,  and  turned  his  face  toward  Boston 
and  practical  life. 


34  CHARLES  SUMNER, 


CHAPTER   IV. 

1840-1845. 

LAW  PRACTICE  IN  BOSTON. DOMESTIC  LIFE.  —  PER 
SONAL  CHARACTERISTICS. SOCIAL  POSITION. ORA 
TION,  "TRUE  GRANDEUR  OF  NATIONS." 

THE  five  years  which  succeeded  this  extraordinary 
experience  were  among  the  least  eventful  years  of 
Sumner's  life.  They  counted  for  less  in  the  general 
perspective.  Their  chief  value  was  in  a  sort  of  set 
tling  process,  for  when  they  ended  with  the  famous 
oration  on  the  "True  Grandeur  of  Nations,"  and  he 
definitely  entered  political  life,  some  things  were 
established  which  both  by  suggestion  and  elimina 
tion  made  the  future  plain.  So  far  as  incident  was 
concerned,  his  life  went  on  simply  enough.  As  be 
fore  his  journey,  there  were  few  clients  and  much 
legal  writing,  with  some  lectures  at  Cambridge,  and 
the  hard  work  necessary  to  the  editing  of  twenty 
volumes  of  law-reports.  It  is  hardly  surprising  that 
the  law  seemed  something  of  a  drudgery.  The 
friend  and  companion  of  English  judges  and  German 
scholars  did  not  find  the  small  practice  of  a  young 
lawyer  very  exciting.  Nor  was  it  easy  for  the  favour 
ite  of  an  aristocratic  society,  himself  unduly  reserved, 
to  discover  that  condescension  is  hardly  the  attitude 


DOMESTIC  LIFE.  35 

most  satisfactory  to  a  client,  or  that  even  brother- 
lawyers  may  not  care  to  hear  for  hours  together  of 
the  legal  customs  of  France.  Thus  it  came  to  pass 
that  notwithstanding  some  professional  success  and 
a  still  growing  reputation,  Sumner  felt  himself  a 
failure  at  the  law,  and  although  perhaps  not  realizing 
it  himself,  was  ready  for  other  work. 

His  domestic  and  personal  relations  had  greatly 
changed.  During  his  stay  in  Rome,  in  the  spring 
of  1839,  his  father  died.  Father  and  son  were  too 
much  alike  for  entire  harmony,  and  the  dominant 
quality  so  largely  developed  in  both  had  early  clashed, 
so  that  for  some  time  Charles  had  not  lived  at  home. 
On  his  return  from  Europe,  however,  he  went  directly 
to  his  mother's  house  at  20  Hancock  Street,  Boston, 
which  remained  thereafter  his  home.  Three  of  his 
four  sisters  were  dead;  one  of  them,  the  beautiful 
Mary,  was  a  particular  favourite  of  the  eldest  brother, 
and  her  long  illness  and  death  moved  him  profoundly. 
His  brothers  were  widely  scattered,  —  one  in  South 
America,  another  engaged  in  that  curious  attempt  at 
the  millennium  at  Brook  Farm,  George  already  much 
at  home  in  Europe,  and  Albert  married  and  settled 
down  to  a  life  of  elegant  leisure.  Only  the  young 
est  sister,  Julia,  still  belonged  to  the  mother's  house 
hold.  Sumner' s  circle  of  friends  had  changed  greatly 
also  ;  Cleveland,  the  friend  who  called  him  "  Charley," 
was  gone,  Howe  was  married  to  the  brilliant  Julia 
Ward,  and  Longfellow  had  set  up  a  roof- tree  in 
Cambridge. 

Sumner  made  frequent  trips  to  the  mountains  and 
the  sea,  riding  horseback  with  one  young  woman  or 


36  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

another  at  the  old  Knickerbocker  country  places  on 
the  Hudson,  enjoying  the  society  and  hills  of  Lenox 
during  a  convalescence  from  the  only  illness  recorded 
of  him  till  his  accident,  running  down  to  New  York 
for  a  day  or  two,  or  a  dinner.  Everywhere  he  met  the 
most  famous  people  at  hand,  and  altogether  led  an 
ideal  life  for  a  man  of  the  world,  though  not  always 
to  the  advantage  of  the  young  lawyer,  f  The  domestic 
side  of  his  nature  was  rarely  shown,  [indeed,  he  was 
a  man  of  curious  contradictions.  His1  sister  Julia,  in 
speaking  of  this  very  time,  says  :  "  There  was  a  world 
of  love  and  tenderness  within  him  often  hidden  under 
a  cold  exterior  or  crusted  over  with  a  chilling  coat  of 
reserve  ;  "  and  she  dwells  with  loving  recollections  on 
his  interest  in  her  studies  and  pleasures,  his  attentions 
to  their  sister  Mary  in  society,  and  the  frequent  theat 
rical  expeditions  in  which  they  all  engaged.  Full  of 
affection,  playful,  tender,  over-sensitive,  he  was  known 
to  his  friends  as  genial  and  amiable,  eager  to  do  a 
kindness,  longing  for  love  and  care,  much  coveting 
the  special  satisfactions  of  wife  and  home.  Yet  even 
in  these  younger  days  of  enthusiasm,  his  affection 
was  reserved  for  a  few.  His  care  for  his  family 
was  largely  a  sense  of  responsibility;  his  letters  to 
them  were  didactic  in  the  extreme,  and  painfully  su 
perior;  and  even  his  sorrows  were  soon  assuaged. 
Moreover,  while  to  one  friend  he  lamented  the  lack  of 
wife  and  home,  to  another  he  congratulated  himself 
on  the  freedom  of  the  bachelor  state.  Many  stories 
are  told  of  kindnesses  to  individuals  and  his  amia 
bility  under  all  tests.  Of  this  sort  were  his  labours  to 
collect  the  money  to  send  a  poor  boy  to  college ;  the 


PERSONAL    CHARACTERISTICS.  37 

time  and  trouble  he  gave  to  the  art  education  of  a  rich 
young  Bostonian,  with  invaluable  results  to  his  native 
city ;  or,  later  on,  at  one  of  the  busiest  periods  of  his 
life,  his  suggestions  for  the  reading  of  a  young  girl  in 
Washington,  j  Nevertheless,  the  world  at  large,  from 
the  beginning,  found  him  stiff  and  reserved,  very  dif 
ficult  of  approach,  and  somewhat  careless  of  particular 
interests.  Such  contradictions  are  not  easy  to  ex 
plain.  They  are  perhaps  best  left  to  speak  for  them 
selves,  in  a  world  where  the  personality  of  men  is 
ever  mixed,  and  where  the  temperament  often 
struggles  with  the  heart.  Two  things  may  be  said, 
however,  as  bearing  on  the  matter.  The  lack  of  sym 
pathy,  already  noted  as  a  prominent  characteristic, 
effectually  prevented  Charles  Sumner  from  entering 
into  the  feelings  of  a  person  whom  he  did  not  like 
or  understand.  Therefore  it  must  needs  be  that  the 
friendly  and  beautiful  side  which  he  showed  to  his 
congenial  friends,  he  could  not  show  to  the  general 
public.  Moreover,  his  other  characteristic,  of  regard 
ing  all  subjects  and  all  people  as  they  concerned  him, 
grew  as  life  went  on.  At  this  time  it  was  only  a 
trait,  and  while  it  appeared  too  often  and  caused 
some  action  hard  to  explain  in  view  of  his  reputed 
qualities,  or  settled  questions  of  consideration  and 
affection  somewhat  unsatisfactorily,  it  was  not  yet 
constant  and  all-pervading.  To  different  people  and 
at  different  times  Sumner  showed  different  sides,  even 
more  than  men  usually  do ;  but  during  these  years  of 
his  life  the  charming,  genial,  amiable,  domestic  side 
greatly  preponderated  over  any  other.  "  Friend 
ship,  sympathy,  and  kindness  are  a  peculiar  necessity 


38  CHARLES  SUMNEK. 

of  my  nature,  and  I  can  have  few  losses  greater  than 
the  breaking  of  these  bonds,"  he  said ;  but  it  was 
also  true  that  at  all  times  —  though  much  more  in 
later  life  than  now  —  he  was  not  always  careful  to 
offer  his  side  of  such  friendships,  unless  there  was 
much  to  attract. 

His  social  position  in  Boston  was  at  its  height; 
never  before  had  he  secured  the  entrance  into 
circles  which  now  opened  to  his  European  reputa 
tion,  but  which  speedily  enough  closed  again.  At 
last  he  was  welcome  in  that  curious  penetralia  of  old 
Boston  known  by  Dr.  Holmes's  clever  phrase  as  the 
"  Brahmin  "  set.  For  a  little  while,  and  by  a  sort  of 
sufferance,  he  was  admitted  to  that  exclusive  circle. 
It  was  the  vise  of  Europe  which  gave  him  the  suf 
ficient  passport.  Certainly  the  son  of  Charles 
Pinckney  Sumner,  however  large  a  place  that  official 
held  in  the  world,  had  no  right  of  inheritance  in 
"society;"  and  the  brilliant  young  scholar  had 
made  his  own  position  in  those  literary  circles  which 
had  little  to  do  with  this  selfsame  social  world. 
But  after  his  return  from  England,  houses  opened  to 
him  that  never  had  opened  before,  and  he  grew  to  be 
a  favourite  in  circles  where  he  was  an  unknown  quan 
tity  at  an  earlier  date.  At  that  time  much  more  than 
now,  political  lines  were  closely  drawn  in  social  circles. 
To  be  in  good  form  it  was  absolutely  necessary  to  be 
a  Whig.  Bancroft  was  already  cast  out  because  he 
had  become  a  Democrat,  and  his  social  limitations 
were  a  prophecy  of  what  befell  his  friend  later  on. 
But  Sumner  was  in  good  and  regular  standing  in 
Whig  politics,  and  regarded  as  one  upon  whom  the 


SOCIAL  POSITION.  39 

mantle  of  office  was  likely  to  fall.  Thus,  intimately 
at  home  in  that  brilliant  literary  group  which  counted 
among  its  stars  Channing,  Felton,  Washington  Allston, 
Choate,  Samuel  G.  Howe,  Bancroft,  Prescott,  and 
Longfellow,  and  a  welcome  guest  in  more  exclusive 
circles,  he  was  much  in  society,  and  enjoyed  both  its 
gayeties  and  its  quieter  aspects. 

His  public  spirit  was  easily  aroused,  especially 
where  his  friends  were  concerned.  It  was  he 
that  brought  about  the  purchase  of  Crawford's 
statue  of  Orpheus  for  the  Boston  Museum  of 
Fine  Arts,  notwithstanding  the  necessary  sub 
scription  was  secured  with  difficulty;  he  raised 
also  with  still  greater  difficulty,  and  at  last  with 
some  financial  trouble  for  himself,  the  five  thousand 
dollars'  testimonial  to  Horace  Mann  for  services  in 
the  cause  of  education ;  and  in  many  like  ways 
did  he  serve  his  friends  and  his  public.  His  mind 
was  good  soil,  in  which  the  seed  of  public  problems 
brought  forth  a  hundred-fold.  English  friends  had 
already  interested  him  along  such  lines,  for  hap 
pily  his  visit  abroad  was  just  at  a  time  when  the 
atmosphere  was  surcharged  with  moral  questions, 
and  the  first  spring  of  many  of  Sumner's  philan 
thropic  efforts  is  easily  found  in  his  friendship  with 
English  reformers,  or  his  discussion  of  the  duties 
of  government  with  the  English  aristocracy.  In 
the  same  manner  when  his  dear  friend  Dr.  Howe 
found  himself  between  the  upper  and  nether  mill 
stone  in  the  Prison  Discipline  Society,  Sumner  was 
all  on  fire  at  once.  His  study  of  French  prison 
systems  and  his  personal  acquaintance  with  De 


40  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

Metz,  the  creator  of  Mettray,  gave  him  much 
knowledge  not  generally  possessed  by  his  opponents, 
and  he  proved  an  able  advocate  of  the  separate 
system,  then  believed  to  be  almost  a  panacea  for 
crime  by  such  poenologists  as  Dorothea  Dix  and 
Samuel  G.  Howe. 

*  In  such  labours,  such  distractions,  and  such  spas 
modic  efforts  the  five  years  slipped  away,  and  sud 
denly  there  came  the  moment  which  had  waited  for 
him ;  and  thereafter,  though  the  next  five  years  wore 
much  the  same  dress  as  those  just  before,  they  looked 
in  a  different  direction,  and  marked  a  new  beginning, 
—  the  entrance  to  his  career,  the  preface  to  his  work. 
On  the  4th  of  July,  1845,  the  city  of  Boston,  as 
was  her  custom,  assembled  in  state  to  celebrate  the 
beginnings  of  the  nation ;  for  in  those  days  we  were 
still  counting  the  years  from  our  birthday.  It  was  the 
occasion  of  much  ceremony  and  such  military  glory 
as  inhered  in  the  militia,  the  veterans  of  1812,  and 
the  memories  of  Bunker  Hill.  It  was,  moreover,  the 
time  when  men  were  hot  with  the  desire  for  war  with 
England,  —  a  desire  born  of  outraged  rights,  but 
nursed  in  ignorance,  —  and  when  a  war  with  Mexico 
was  already  half  begun,  based  on  the  burning  ques 
tion  of  slavery.  The  occasion  and  the  audience  were 
well  worth  a  young  man's  pride,  and  Sumner's  repu 
tation  made  his  selection  as  orator  in  every  way 
natural.  As  usual  with  him,  he  chose  a  subject  of 
which  his  mind  was  already  full,  —  the  value  and  the 
duty  of  international  peace ;  and  for  two  hours  he 
poured  forth  a  stream  of  classical  allusions,  historic 
facts,  and  polished  periods.  He  had  thought  much 


"TRUE   GRANDEUR   OF  NATIONS."  41 

on  this  subject,  and  his  convictions  were  pronounced. 
His  moral  enthusiasms,  still  somewhat  undisciplined 
by  life,  led  him  to  this  point  of  view,  and  his  friends 
Mann  and  Howe  had  fostered  the  tendency.  In 
England  he  had  known  many  advocates  of  the  doc 
trine  of  universal  peace,  while  his  intense  interest  in 
that  country,  and  his  new  sense  of  the  value  of  rela 
tions  with  her,  made  an  English  war  seem  to  him  more 
than  ever  abhorrent,  while  his  feelings  as  to  the  pro 
found  wrong  of  slavery  entered  into  his  horror  of  the 
proposed  Mexican  invasion.  Who  shall  say  that  his 
own  ambitions  did  not  also  lend  strength  to  his  desire 
to  vindicate  some  other  distinctions  than  those  of 
war?  On  the  value  of  peace  his  was  indeed  a  full 
mind. 

The  lack  of  fitness  in  his  subject  for  the  occasion 
—  further,  its  absolute  unfitness  —  probably  never 
occurred  to  him.  We  shall  have  occasion  more  than 
once  to  see  how  his  habit  of  centring  his  thought 
round  himself  and  his  own  views  hindered  his  seeing 
the  views  of  others  in  any  perspective  whatever. 
Totally  unable  (as  must  be  said  so  often)  to  compre 
hend  or  care  for  the  position  of  his  opponents,  he 
never  could  understand  the  effect  of  his  own  words. 
To  this  mental  peculiarity,  rather  than  to  any  inten 
tional  discourtesy,  is  to  be  attributed  his  choice  of  a 
subject  and  his  treatment  of  it,  his  attacks  upon  the 
profession  of  the  men  around  and  about  him,  his  ar 
guments  against  their  patriotic  conviction,  his  espousal 
of  the  views  of  a  small  part  of  his  audience,  his  criti 
cism  of  the  national  pride  of  all  before  him.  Yet 
such  was  the  force  of  his  learning,  the  power  of  his 


42  CHARLES  SUMMER. 

brilliant  oratory,  and  the  fascination  of  the  speaker 
that  thenceforth  he  was  known  as  a  great  man.  Fame 
was  slow  in  coming  to  him,  but  from  this  time  it  was 
his  permanent  possession. 

This  oration  marked  him  for  public  life.  Those 
who  listened  in  dismayed  rage,  the  great  men  who 
thought  it  necessary  publicly  to  dispute  its  positions 
that  evening,  and  the  distinguished  friends  who  up 
held  it,  all  felt  the  force  and  power  of  the  orator. 
That  Sumner  believed  it  to  be  the  beginning  of  his 
public  career,  is  evidenced  by  the  fact  that  he  gives 
it  the  first  place  in  his  collected  works.  What  he 
Was  at  this  parting  of  the  ways,  his  lifelong  friend 
George  F.  Hoar  has  beautifully  summed  up  in  re 
viewing  his  biography.  Senator  Hoar  says  of  Sumner 
at  this  time,  — 

u  We  have  here  a  man  of  thirty  four,  of  a  nature  vehe 
ment  and  self-confident,  tempered  slightly  with  respect 
for  elders ;  of  strong  family  affections,  taking  great  de 
light  in  friendship ;  so  attracting  and  so  being  attracted 
by  the  best  and  greatest  men  that  in  that  large  circle  of  in 
timacies,  embracing  a  list  of  famous  names  unapproached 
by  any  other  biography  of  modern  times,  there  cannot  be 
found  the  name  of  a  bad  or  mean,  and  scarcely  that  of 
an  obscure,  man;  of  an  innocence  and  purity  absolutely 
without  a  stain;  of  a  singular  sincerity  and  directness  of 
speech  and  conduct ;  of  marvellous  industry ;  of  almost 
miraculous  memory;  without  humour;  without  a  per 
sonal  enemy,  never  having  had  a  quarrel ;  loving  the 
contemplation  of  the  highest  models  of  excellence,  and 
of  the  loftiest  and  simplest  maxims  of  virtue ;  delighting 
especially  in  the  study  of  that  science  which  applies  the 
rules  of  the  moral  law  to  the  conduct  of  men ;  fearless  of 
opposition ;  of  commanding  presence ;  with  the  faculty 


"TRUE   GRANDEUR   OF  NATIONS."  43 

of  rapid  and  thorough  investigation;  with  vast  stores  of 
learning  always  at  his  command;  of  a  magnetic  elo 
quence  which  inspired  and  captivated  large  masses  of 
men  as  he  moulded  the  lessons  of  history,  the  ornaments 
of  literature,  the  commandments  of  law,  human  and 
divine,  into  his  burning  and  impassioned  argument." 


44  CHARLES  SUMNER. 


CHAPTER  V. 

1845-1850. 

POLITICAL  CONDITIONS,  1840-1850. FREE-SOIL  PARTY. 

—  SUMNER'S   FIRST  INTEREST  IN  POLITICS.  —  BOSTON 
OSTRACISM. LITERARY  ORATIONS. 

IF  the  five  years  before  1845  were  years  of  waiting, 
the  following  five  were  largely  years  of  preparation. 
Sumner  was  no  longer  young,  but  fast  hastening  on  to 
his  prime.  Nevertheless,  his  career  did  not  develop 
till  1851,  when  he  stepped  into  public  life  at  that 
point  where  it  usually  culminates,  —  the  United  States 
Senate. 

The  decade  between  his  life  in  London  and  his 
life  in  Washington,  though  overshadowed  by  the  next 
ten  years,  was  not  uneventful  in  public  affairs.  The 
National  Bank  difficulties  left  their  train  behind  in 
disturbed  finances  and  legislation  frequently  conflict 
ing  with  itself  as  the  controlling  party  changed.  The 
brief  but  bloody  war  with  Mexico,  and  the  long  con 
gressional  struggle,  ended  in  the  annexation  of  the 
vast  and  valuable  domain  of  Texas.  The  treaty  of 
1846  gave  us  a  new  boundary  in  the  Northwest,  pre 
serving  for  us  royal  states,  and,  through  a  fatal  mis 
take,  losing  as  much  as  it  gained.  California  was 
saved  from  both  Mexico  and  England  by  a  series  of 


POLITICAL    CONDITIONS,   1840-1850.  45 

stirring  events,  and  was  scarcely  a  territory  before 
she  was  also  a  state,  and  had  changed  the  whole 
course  of  our  national  development.  For  good  or 
for  ill,  the  spade  of  that  workman  on  Sutter's  Ranch 
which  turned  up  the  few  grains  of  gold,  offered  the 
United  States  her  first  taste  of  the  vast  mineral  wealth 
on  which  she  has  grown  so  great,  and  not  only  altered 
the  nature  of  her  problems,  but  rapidly  —  too  rapidly 
—  hastened  their  unfolding.  The  Mormons  began 
their  baleful  existence  in  Utah,  and  the  Seminole  War 
left  us  the  double  legacy  of  Florida  and  of  the  long 
struggle  with  our  Indian  difficulty.  In  things  political 
there  were  many  changes  also,  some  of  them  impor 
tant.  In  the  White  House,  Jackson  gave  way  to  Van 
Buren,  and  Van  Buren  to  Harrison  and  Tyler,  who 
were  speedily  followed  by  Polk,  and  he  in  turn  suc 
ceeded  by  Taylor  and  Fillmore.  Thus,  by  reason  of 
death  and  political  change,  sixteen  years  —  four  ad 
ministrations  —  saw  six  Presidents,  marking  a  con 
stant  fluctuation  of  parties.  The  Whig  party  saw  its 
first  success,  grew  great,  and  began  its  decline ;  the 
Democratic  party  was  rapidly  regaining  the  control  it 
preserved  for  ten  years.  And  out  of  the  confusion  of 
the  time  grew  up  more  than  one  attempt,  of  greater 
or  less  importance,  to  create  new  political  centres. 
The  question  of  slavery  was  the  vital  question  all  over 
the  country.  This  divided  the  Whigs  into  Cotton 
Whigs  and  Conscience  Whigs,  and  this  broke  up  the 
Democrats  into  unreconcilable  factions ;  and  out  of 
the  tumult  in  men's  minds  and  the  divisions  of  judg 
ment  as  to  duty  or  expediency,  arose  one  of  those 
attempts  at  a  new  party  which  developed  into  perma- 


46  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

nent  results.  In  1839  first  appeared  the  Liberty 
party.  Local  political  divisions  in  the  state  of  New 
York  (then  as  now  so  important  to  the  success  of 
any  election) ,  and  the  intrigues  growing  out  of  them, 
gave  it  an  adventitious  strength,  and  out  of  it  even 
tually  sprang  another  organization.  That  group  of 
famous  politicians  in  New  York,  led  by  the  king-maker, 
Thurlow  Weed,  were  anxious  to  prevent  the  nomina 
tion  of  Clay  by  the  Whigs.  To  this  end,  through 
careful  and  somewhat  intricate  manipulations  of  the 
political  forces  of  their  own  state,  they  caused  the 
defection  of  Whigs  in  New  York  which  led  to  the 
nomination  of  Birney  as  a  "  Liberty "  candidate. 
This  secured,  by  hidden  ways,  their  purpose  in  the 
defeat  of  Clay  and  the  nomination  of  Harrison  by 
the  Whig  convention,  as  one  who  "  would  carry  New 
York."  Thus,  like  the  cat  in  the  fable,  the  anti-slavery 
men  pulled  the  chestnuts  out  of  the  fire  with  little 
profit  to  themselves.  In  order  to  revenge  a  grudge 
against  Van  Buren  and  to  defeat  Clay,  was  brought 
about  —  through  the  effort  of  their  enemies  —  the 
organization  of  the  Liberty  party,  out  of  which  sub 
sequently  grew  the  Free-Soil  party,  developing  after 
ward  into  the  Republican  party. 

During  these  political  strifes  and  changes  Congress 
was  still  and  always  occupied  with  the  more  direct 
fight  over  slavery.  The  right  of  petition  against  this 
evil  was  recovered  in  1845,  after  a  prohibition  for  a 
full  score  of  years ;  but  the  only  change  was  in  the  im 
mediate  occasion  of  the  debate.  Its  nature  remained 
the  same,  and  its  fury  was  unabated,  while  the  enor 
mous  acquisition  of  territory  in  both  the  South  and 


POLITICAL   CONDITIONS,  184Q-1850.          47 

the  North  was  as  fuel  to  the  flame.  The  controversy 
progressed  by  stages,  and  it  is  necessary  to  recount 
these. steps,  well  known  as  they  are,  to  make  clear  the 
situation.  The  bitter  fight  over  Texas  ended  in  the 
measure  which  repealed  the  Missouri  Compromise, 
leaving  open  the  whole  disputed  question  of  the  ter 
ritories  j  and  with  this  same  "  peaceful  settlement " 
came  the  Fugitive  Slave  law  of  1850,  which  took 
that  matter  out  of  the  hands  of  the  states  and  gave  it 
to  the  nation,  —  a  law  whose  enforcement  perhaps 
did  more  to  break  up  slavery  than  any  other  single 
measure,  by  reason  of  the  public  sentiment  it  created 
throughout  the  North.  From  the  organization  of  the 
territory  of  Oregon  till  the  secession  of  South  Caro 
lina  in  1 86 1,  the  territories  furnished  the  battle 
ground  for  national  freedom  or  slavery.  Beginning 
even  with  the  acquisition  of  Texas,  there  was  the 
never-ending  attempt  to  attach  to  each  act  that 
created  a  new  territory,  the  famous  Wilmot  Proviso 
prohibiting  slavery  in  all  the  territories.  With  New 
Mexico  and  Utah  came  the  doctrine  of  "Squatter 
Sovereignty,"  which  now  and  again  bore  unexpected 
fruit  for  freedom  in  California  and  Kansas.  Slavery  — 
and  even  the  slave-trade  —  in  the  District  of  Colum 
bia  became  a  not  inconsiderable  factor  in  the  final 
issue.  Thus  back  and  forth  went  the  battle.  Many 
a  minor  provision  was  the  occasion  of  great  debate ; 
many  a  public  man  v/ill  go  down  to  history  because 
of  some  measure  proposed  in  that  time,  or  some 
ringing  speech ;  and  many  a  statesman  made  or 
marred  his  whole  career  by  an  ill-considered  vote  or 
hasty  letter  in  those  fateful  years.  It  was  during  this 


48  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

time  that  Toombs  hurled  his  fiery  invective  against 
the  North ;  it  was  then  that  Calhoun  gathered  up  his 
failing  energies  for  his  great  compromise  measure,  so 
well  adapted  to  secure  forever  Southern  supremacy ; 
it  was  then  that  the  brilliant  career  of  Henry  Clay 
culminated  and  died  out,  and  then  that  Webster  sold 
his  birthright. 

This  was  a  stirring  time  in  the  national  life.  Massa 
chusetts  felt  her  share  of  the  excitement,  and  marched 
in  the  van  of  political  action,  as  she  is  wont  to  do 
when  she  marches  in  rank  at  all.  More  often  she 
carries  on  that  guerilla  warfare  so  dear  to  her,  rashly 
venturing  into  the  outermost  post  of  danger,  following 
her  own  impulse  to  glory  or  destruction  as  it  may  be, 
but  sometimes  leading  the  whole  army  to  the  onset. 
She  felt  particularly  the  political  divisions  of  the  latter 
half  of  this  period.  The  Whigs  within  her  border 
were  torn  and  divided  by  personal  feeling.  Webster's 
fluctuating  positions  had  much  to  do  with  this,  and 
other  personal  ambitions  and  local  jealousies  entered 
into  the  problem.  These  complications  bore  great 
fruit  in  Massachusetts,  as  like  intrigues  had  done  in 
New  York.  Abbott  Lawrence  and  other  prominent 
Massachusetts  men  in  the  Whig  convention  sent  Clay 
to  his  defeat  again,  and  worked  for  the  nomination  of 
Taylor,  hoping,  it  is  said,  thus  to  secure  the  place  of 
Vice-President  for  Lawrence  himself.  And  out  of 
rage  and  disgust  at  the  nomination  of  Taylor,  —  a 
slaveholder,  and  hero  of  the  war  fought  for  slavery, 
—  arose  the  bolt  of  Henry  Wilson  and  Charles  Allen, 
delegates  from  Massachusetts  to  that  same  convention ; 
and  therefrom  grew  the  Free-Soil  party  of  Massachu- 


SUMNER'S  FIRST  INTEREST  IN  POLITICS.    49 

setts  a  few  weeks  later.  Thus  as  the  Liberty  party 
sprang  from  equal  parts  of  principle  and  political 
complication  in  New  York,  so  the  Free-Soil  party 
sprang  from  equal  parts  of  principle  and  political 
intrigue  in  Massachusetts ;  and  later  on  by  the  same 
methods  came  the  Republican  party,  heir  of  them 
both.  These  and  other  factions  divided  the  politics 
of  Massachusetts  and  excited  her  citizens.  Sumner, 
although  not  altogether  oblivious,  at  first  was  not 
greatly  interested.  His  thoughts  were  occupied  for 
the  most  part  with  his  friends,  his  correspondence, 
literature,  and  philanthropy,  although  occasionally  he 
would  side  with  one  faction  or  another,  or  show  some 
excitement  over  the  question  of  slavery.  But  with 
his  Fourth  of  July  oration  began  a  new  era.  His  suc 
cess  made  him  a  favourite  speaker  for  all  occasions. 
In  public  matters,  his  interest  in  moral  issues,  and 
his  opposition  to  slavery  and  the  Mexican  War,  not 
only  caused  the  Whigs  to  look  askance  upon  him, 
but  gave  him  something  more  than  a  trend  toward 
the  Abolitionists,  and  greatly  increased  the  sympathy 
between  him  and  men  like  Garrison  and  Phillips. 
So  it  came  about  that  among  the  beautiful  orations 
and  addresses  there  began  to  appear  a  plentiful 
sprinkling  of  political  questions,  although  literary  or 
scholarly  topics  predominated. 

In  the  more  numerous  class  were  the  famous  address 
to  the  Phi  Beta  Kappa  Society  at  Harvard,  where, 
under  the  title  of  "  the  Scholar,  the  Jurist,  the  Artist, 
and  the  Philanthropist,"  he  eulogized  his  friends  Pick 
ering,  Story,  Allston,  and  Channing ;  the  oration  on 
"  Fame  and  Glory  "  at  Amherst  College,  an  apotheosis 

4 


5°  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

of  the  brotherhood  of  man ;  the  "  Law  of  Human 
Progress,"  in  which  he  prophesied  the  great  future  of 
humanity  to  the  Phi  Beta  Kappa  men  at  Union  Col 
lege  ;  and  another  expression  of  his  views  on  war, 
delivered  to  the  Peace  Society  in  Boston.  These 
and  others  of  a  like  nature  are  the  last  of  their 
kind.  In  all  the  fifteen  volumes  of  his  works  which 
Mr.  Sumner  himself  collected  from  his  twenty  years 
of  public  life,  —  including  even  letters  in  which  he 
declined  to  speak,  —  we  find  after  1850  scarcely  a 
dozen  productions  of  any  sort  not  delivered  to  the 
Senate  or  on  some  political  subject.  From  this  time 
he  ceased  to  be  the  man  of  letters,  he  became  the 
public  man.  The  subject-matter  of  these  early  ora 
tions  dealt  mostly  with  principles  and  philosophies  of 
life,  with  the  moral  questions  so  dear  to  his  heart,  and 
the  connection  therewith  of  the  men  he  eulogized,  or 
the  interest  in  such  issues  he  would  inspire  in  the 
audience  before  him.  High  purpose  was  his  test  of 
excellence,  duty  was  the  guide  he  invoked.  As  in 
the  "  True  Grandeur  of  Nations,"  these  addresses 
were  heavy  with  ancient  and  modern  classics,  and 
teemed  with  references  to  that  foreign  standpoint 
said  to  furnish  a  contemporary  posterity.  Indeed,  a 
full  appreciation  of  their  allusions  was  beyond  the 
popular  ear,  and  required  a  wide  scholarship.  His 
style  he  himself  has  somewhere  called  an  "  architec 
tural  style ;  "  and  in  truth  it  was  a  building,  not  a 
growth,  for  each  oration  was  carefully  planned,  and 
the  structure  built  up  piece  by  piece,  until  it  became 
a  mighty  edifice,  —  but  the  edifice  was  a  colosseum. 
The  plan  was  suggested  at  the  beginning,  continually  re- 


LITERARY  ORATIONS.  51 

ferred  to  and  gathered  up,  and  the  argument  condensed 
and  repeated  at  the  close.  The  reader  or  hearer  was 
left  in  no  doubt  as  to  what  Sumner  wanted  to  say. 
Occasionally,  as  when  he  spoke  on  "  White  Slavery," 
the  speech  became  a  perfect  arsenal  of  facts,  all 
ranged  round  some  principle,  supporting  or  defend 
ing  by  the  indirect  means  of  their  selection,  quite  as 
much  as  more  directly.  The  rhetoric  was  lofty,  so 
much  so  that  it  was  sometimes  stilted ;  but  his  beauti 
ful  choice  and  collocation  of  words,  and  his  power  of 
illustration,  lighted  up  the  close  massed  phrases  like 
the  banners  of  an  army ;  and  a  great  personal  enthu 
siasm  gave  the  fire  and  force,  the  life  and  swing,  of 
which  so  much  is  said,  but  which  is  somewhat  wanting 
to  the  printed  page.  Nevertheless,  these  are  real 
orations,  strong  with  logic,  beautiful  with  the  stately 
beauty  of  the  classics.  They  are  of  a  style  already  past 
and  gone,  and  this  age,  enamoured  of  the  colloquial, 
sometimes  calls  them  heavy  and  pedantic.  It  were 
better  to  discover  that  these  were  literature  as  well  as 
argument ;  orations,  not  discourses,  —  to  discover 
once  more  a  beauty  that  is  faultless,  if  not  familiar ;  a 
style  that,  if  too  heavy  with  ornament,  is  still  so  grand 
and  majestic  that  it  can  safely  carry  such  elaboration. 
But  amid  these  elegant  occupations  there  began 
to  appear  a  new  zeal  for  public  affairs.  The  humani 
ties  were  fast  giving  way  to  humanity.  With  the 
organization  of  the  Free-Soil  party,  as  has  been  said. 
frininpr  ^ppppd  boldjy  intn  the  field.  The  occasion 
which  pushed  him  to  the  front  was  an  open  letter  to 
Robert  C.  Winthrop,  arraigning  him  for  his  vote  in  the 
House  of  Representatives  in  favour  of  the  Mexican 


52  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

War.  The  letter  was  too  severe  and  scathing  to  be 
either  forgotten  or  forgiven.  More  than  any  other 
one  thing  it  fixed  Summer's  position  as  a  representa 
tive  of  the  anti-slavery  men  of  his  state,  and  it  was 
the  first  step  in  a  course  which  in  a  few  months  shut 
in  his  face  the  open  doors  of  Boston  society.  This 
attack  upon  Winthrop  and  his  criticisms  of  Webster, 
—  the  idols  of  conservative  Boston, — with  his  avowed 
sympathy  for  the  despised  Free-Soilers,  placed  him 
without  the  pale  of  recognition.  The  fashionable 
world  chose  public  places  like  subscription-balls  in 
which  to  snub  the  young  man,  pointedly  turning  away 
from  him.  Webster  hardly  spoke  when  they  met  on 
one  such  occasion,  and  many  who  had  been  proud 
to  call  him  friend  now  declined  to  know  him.  The 
great  houses  whose  welcome  Smnne*-4iad  so  prized 
.closed  their  doors  to  him.  Many  drawing-rooms 
where  this  young  man  of  the  world  had  found  a 
ready  entrance  most  agreeable  to  him,  such  as  the 
Ticknors'  and  the  Eliots',  literally  refused  him  all 
social  relations  ;  and  one  could  count  on  a  few  fingers 
the  homes  where  he  was  still  an  honoured  guest. 
Charles  Sumner's  advocacy  of  the  slave  was  at  the 
cost  of  that  which  just  then  he  most  valued  in  life ; 
and,  especially  sensitive  to  slights  and  social  neglect, 
he  suffered  keenly.  To  the  end  of  his  life  he  remem 
bered  the  sting  and  suffering  of  this  time,  when,  just 
as  he  had  achieved  a  position  long  desired  and 
greatly  appreciated,  he  lost  its  proud  foothold  by  his 
own  act.  It  is  idle  to  inquire  whether  or  not  he  ex 
pected  this  consequence.  When  he  entered  on  the 
work,  he  probably  did  not  anticipate  this  result  at  all ; 


BOSTON  OSTRACISM.  53 

doubtless  he  thought  his  position  and  his  personal 
attraction  were  such  that  he  was  secure.  Moreover, 
he  was  not  wont  to  think  of  consequences,  nor  did  he 
much  care  for  them,  —  partly  from  a  noble  devotion  to 
a  cause  he  believed  right,  partly  from  a  supreme  con 
fidence  in  his  own  place  and  power,  and  a  certain 
obstinacy  of  purpose  that  helped  greatly  to  carry  him 
through  any  difficult  duty  upon  which  he  had  once 
entered.  But  say  what  we  may  of  natural  causes 
and  reasons  of  temperament,  the  fact  remains  that, 
without  regard  to  Present  or  future,  Sumner  calmly 
stepped  out  of  the  mace  he  so  coveted,  and  took  up 
the  cause  of  human  freedom  when  above  all  others  it 
was  despised  and  rejected  of  men. 

It  was  the  more  extraordinary  that  Sumner  broke 
away  from  the  old  Whig  part  vnij  because  naturally 
his  sympathies  lay  there.  He  was  all  his  life  an 
aristocrat,  and  not  a  democrat.  He  espoused  the 
cause  of  the  oppressed  on  the  broad  lines  of  hu 
manity.  He  worked  for  the  downtrodden,  but  rarely 
if  ever  did  he  enter  into  their  suffering,  and  feel  with 
them  ;  he  was  their  friend,  not  their  brother.  This  is 
the  aristocratic  temper,  and  this  was  born  in  Sumner, 
child  of  the  people  though  he  was  ;  and  by  reason  of 
it  he  was  all  the  more  truly  son  of  New  England,  for 
nowhere  does  the  pride  of  race  beat  stronger  than  in 
the  pulse  of  those  humble  and  homespun  folk.  We 
have  need  to  remember,  therefore,  how  much  Sumner 
flung  aside  when  he  stepped  jnto  the  ranks  of  the 
Free-Soil  art  \\ 


It  goes  without  saying  that  he  was  eagerly  wel 
comed  in  those  despised  ranks  to  which  he  brought  a 


54  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

certain  element  of  academic  distinction  sadly  needed. 
From  that  time  on,  he  spoke  or  presided  at  all  their 
conventions,  and  was  everywhere  one  of  their  favourite 
orators.  Once  or  twice  he  accepted  the  congres 
sional  nomination  from  the  new  party,  and  was  sum 
marily  defeated,  as  indeed  was  expected.  Meanwhile 
he  made  all  roads  lead  to  Rome.  Whether  it  was  an 
argument  before  the  Supreme  Court  on  "  Colored 
Schools  in  Boston,"  or  a  popular  lecture  with  the 
specious  title  of  "White  Slavery  in  the  Barbary 
States,"  it  was  always  a  tremendous  assault  on  slavery; 
and  anti-slavery  platforms  or  pusillanimous  conventions 
of  half-hearted  Whigs  alike  rang  with  his  fierce  denun 
ciations  of  the  iniquity. 


SLAVERY.  55 


CHAPTER   VI. 

SLAVERY. 

THE  question  of  what  turned  Sumner's  thoughts  to 
slavery,  or  rather  what  determined  him  to  enter  the 
fiery  path  of  the  crusade  against  it,  has  already  been 
partly  answered.  In  after  life  he  was  so  identified 
with  this  crusade  that  it  is  difficult  to  realize  a  time 
when  he  was  only  generally  interested  in  it.  We 
have  seen  him  grow  more  and  more  absorbed  there 
in,  and  we  can  better  understand  the  influences  that 
completed  the  work  by  briefly  considering  the  condi 
tion  of  the  country.  The  long  struggle  with  slavery, 
which  had  begun  with  the  beginnings  of  the  nation, 
was  coming  to  its  height,  and  all  the  air  was  full  of 
the  noise  of  it.  Henry  Wilson,  one  of  the  most 
influential  actors  in  the  drama  of  freedom,  said  of 
this  period  that  it  had  "  no  parallel  for  the  in 
tensity,  variety,  and  disastrous  results  of  the  slavery 
struggle." 

It  is  now  almost  impossible  to  reproduce  the  at 
mosphere  of  that  time.  We  of  to-day  can  hardly 
realize  the  institution  of  slavery  as  it  actually  existed. 
More  than  a  sixth  of  the  whole  population  of  the 
country  were  bought  and  sold  at  the  whim  or  neces- 


5  6  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

sity  of  the  moment.  Every  relation  of  humanity  was 
reversed.  Kindness  was  the  policy  of  the  rich  slave 
holder,  but  brutality  was  the  resort  of  the  small 
owner.  Here  and  there,  often  indeed,  the  relation 
of  a  master  to  his  slave  was  that  of  a  patriarch,  draw 
ing  heavily  on  the  sense  of  care  and  responsibility, 
and  perhaps  making  large  drafts  on  the  yearly  in 
come  also ;  but  at  the  best,  death  or  disaster  might 
alter  all  this  at  a  moment,  and  always  fear  and  terror 
lay  in  the  background.  The  "  chattel  "  worked  as 
beasts  of  burden  work,  —  for  no  result  that  he  could 
feel;  suffered  all  things,  and  had  no  redress.  Man 
or  woman,  —  the  strength  of  his  manhood,  the  beauty 
of  her  womanhood,  only  added  to  the  dollars  and 
cents  the  creature  was  worth.  The  exigencies  of  a 
financial  situation  or  the  personal  brutality  of  a  mas 
ter  or  more  often  of  a  Northern-born  overseer,  not  in 
frequently  made  work  to  the  death  the  regular  plan  of 
operations.  Ingenuity  was  taxed  for  new  horrors  of 
punishment,  —  deemed  so  necessary  to  prevent  indi 
vidual  flight  or  concerted  uprising.  The  bloodhound 
was  the  lapdog  of  this  barbarous  civilization.  Chil 
dren  were  torn  from  their  mothers  ;  marriage  was  only 
a  dream,  dissolved  with  the  morning  of  some  new 
day.  To  the  slave,  family  life  was  not;  for  profit 
and  passion  united  to  produce  a  state  of  morals  im 
possible  to  describe  plainly.  It  was  a  crime  to  edu 
cate  ever  so  little  these  children  of  the  night  and 
darkness ;  for  none  knew  so  well  as  these  Southern 
chevaliers  that  learning  was  power.  Even  religion 
turned  two  faces  to  the  South,  —  the  holy  face  of 
sympathy  to  that  poor  and  sorrowful  race  whose  only 


SLAVERY.  57 

help  lay  in  the  Friend  of  the  friendless;  and  the 
mocking  face  of  tradition  to  that  race  of  masters 
whose  patron  saint  was  Abraham,  and  whose  sincerity 
was  the  very  fountain  of  error,  since  their  Bible  was 
their  authority  for  sin. 

But  if  darkness  and  cruelty  and  death  made  up  the 
brief  and  terrible  annals  of  the  slave,  in  some  sense  a 
worse  blight  fell  upon  the  master ;  since  for  him  the 
curse  reached  the  core  of  manhood,  and  attacked 
the  very  centre  of  character.  A  life  to  which  sen 
suality  brought  success  produced  a  strong  and  fiery 
animalism.  The  necessity  of  sharp  and  strong  control 
under  any  circumstance,  and  a  sense  of  superiority 
inbred  in  the  race,  established  a  habit  of  domineer 
ing,  always  present,  and  woven  into  the  very  conscious 
ness  ;  it  was  not  so  much  love  of  power  that  moved 
those  fiery-tempered  men,  as  the  certain  conviction 
that  power  was  theirs  of  inalienable  —  ay,  of  God- 
given  right.  Love  of  ease  was  the  right  hand,  and 
indifference  to  surroundings  the  left  hand  of  a  semi- 
feudal  existence.  Precedent  and  tradition  made  the 
intellectual  standards.  Education  began  with  the 
classics,  and  ended  with  Pope ;  religion  was  in  all 
its  relations  a  question  of  authority.  Strong  and 
noble  men  were^there,  delicate  and  beautiful  women, 
giving  a  brilliancy  and  a  charm  to  society  that  cov 
ered  its  open  sore  and  hid  it  from  unobservant 
eyes.  Yet  all  things  —  living  and  the  dread  of  dying, 
daily  duty  and  immortal  hope  —  were  twisted  and 
intertwined  with  slavery  or  centred  round  it.  Its 
practices  fixed  social  customs,  its  justification  created 
theories.  The  historian  of  American  literature  has 


58  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

beautifully  shown  the  opposite  foundation,  the  con 
flicting  philosophy,  the  irreconcilable  life  of  the  chil 
dren  of  the  cavalier  in  the  South,  and  the  descendants 
of  the  roundhead  in  the  North.  The  one  was  iso 
lated  and  splendid,  fed  with  a  sense  of  superiority  and 
drinking  the  wine  of  individual  life ;  the  other  gath 
ered  together  into  industrious  and  commonplace 
communities,  born  with  a  sense  of  human  rights  and 
advocating  universal  brotherhood,  —  the  one  proudly 
resting  on  slavery,  the  other  in  a  never-ending  dis 
pute  over  the  terms  of  freedom. 

In  the  North,  the  public  conscience  was  at  last 
aroused ;  but  it  was  in  that  restless  state  which  ever 
urges  to  action,  and  is  ever  quieted  with  a  new  expe 
dient.  The  iniquity  of  slavery  could  no  longer  be 
hidden  by  Southern  splendour  or  Northern  business 
interests ;  nevertheless,  it  was  only  here  and  there 
that  it  was  seriously  faced.  Conservatism  was  satis 
fied  with  things  as  they  were ;  political  ambition  was 
complacent ;  above  all  things,  commerce  was  eager 
to  preserve  its  vested  interests  in  a  large  and  rich 
section.  If  the  South  was  blind,  the  North  was  crim 
inal.  Nevertheless,  all  through  the  North  were  men 
and  women  who  cast  all  these  things  to  the  winds, 
and  sacrificed  property,  position,  political  power, 
for  public  duty.  In  the  decade  between  1840  and 
1850  the  excitement  grew  intense.  While  in  the 
South  any  mention  of  slavery  roused  a  bitterness  of 
speech  and  action  now  incredible,  at  the  North  any 
advocate  of  the  black  man  encountered  a  more  inex 
cusable  bitterness.  The  friends  of  the  slave  were  still 
unorganized,  and  they  were  for  the  most  part  a  motley 


SLAVERY.  59 

crew.  There  were  Abolitionists  and  believers  in 
colonization ;  there  were  Quakers  who  were  friends 
of  the  slave  at  any  cost,  and  Quakers  who  were  non- 
resistants  ;  there  were  those  who  would  emancipate  by 
purchase,  and  those  who  would  tear  the  slave  from  his 
owner ;  there  were  the  gradual  emancipationists,  and 
the  fiery  followers  of  Garrison  and  Phillips  who  cried 
out  for  a  dissolution  of  the  Union  by  the  secession 
of  the  North,  and  denounced  the  Constitution  as  a 
"  covenant  with  death  and  a  league  with  hell."  All 
these  factions  and  individuals  fiercely  upheld  their  own 
views,  and  all  would  have  each  his  own  measure  or 
none.  There  was  neither  unity  of  method  nor  even 
unity  of  aim,  but  there  was  constant  and  violent  dis 
pute  and  recrimination.  Men  and  women  who  sepa 
rate  themselves  from  their  fellows  for  a  principle  are 
by  no  means  smooth  and  compliant  companions  ;  and 
strong  individuality,  when  beset  and  persecuted  for 
conscience'  sake,  surely  begets  obstinacy  and  angu 
larity.  It  is  true  enough  that  many  an  early  Aboli 
tionist  was  all  that  is  disagreeable  in  the  popular 
epithet  "  crank  ;  "  but  we  of  to-day  may  well  erect 
monuments  and  study  their  biographies  and  name 
them  martyrs,  for  they  suffered,  and  we  triumph. 
Moreover,  all  who  suffered  for  righteousness'  sake 
were  not  of  this  fierce  spirit.  There  were  calm  and 
sober-minded  men  and  gentle  women  who  gave  them 
selves  freely  to  this  work,  and  who  made  the  double 
sacrifice  of  what  they  gave  up  and  what  they  accepted 
as  they  threw  in  their  lot  with  these  others.  Those 
were  the  little  leaven  that  by  and  by  altered  the 
whole.  And  all  told,  it  was  but  a  few  men  and  a 


60  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

few  women,  beset  on  every  side.  A  part  of  the  great 
world  around  them  in  their  own  states,  in  wicked 
negligence  and  criminal  content,  cared  nothing  or 
was  well  satisfied  that  such  impertinent  protest  should 
be  silenced;  another  and  larger  part,  the  sober- 
minded  and  serious  men,  looked  on  in  doubt  and 
distress.  Abhorring  slavery,  they  could  find  no  right 
to  destroy  it.  Loving  liberty,  they  could  not  believe 
it  meant  license  to  defy  law.  They  believed,  all 
of  them,  that  the  Constitution  upheld  national  slav 
ery,  and  in  sorrow  and  shame  they  saw  no  way  of 
deliverance. 

So  it  was  that  in  the  great  free  North  the  man  or 
woman  who  was  pointed  out  as  an  Abolitionist  was 
insulted  and  assaulted.  Anti-slavery  meetings  were 
always  interrupted  and  often  broken  up  by  the  lowest 
rowdyism,  and  the  authorities  could  find  no  way  to 
interfere.  Only  when  a  runaway  slave  was  caught 
could  justice  be  found  in  the  gates  of  the  city. 
There  was  no  freedom  of  the  Press  but  the  unlimited 
freedom  to  abuse  these  advocates  of  liberty.  And 
still  more,  if  by  any  chance  some  newspaper  dared 
even  mildly  to  disapprove  the  flagrant  denial  of  equal 
rights  to  a  Northern  Abolitionist,  it  was  forthwith 
punished,  sometimes  crushed,  by  the  withdrawal  of 
subscribers  and  advertisers  alike.  The  men  and 
women  themselves  were  completely  ostracized ;  it 
was  a  sentence  of  social  obloquy  to  attend  the  anti- 
slavery  fairs  in  New  England.  Yet  all  along  the 
border  ran  the  underground  railway,  and  every 
where,  from  Cincinnati  and  Syracuse  to  Massachu 
setts  and  Maine,  the  land  was  dotted  with  homes 


SLAVERY.  6 1 

that  succoured  frightened  slaves  and  sent  them  for 
ward  to  Canada.  Many  a  house  found  strange  use 
for  garret  and  cellar ;  churches  built  secret  chambers 
behind  their  organs ;  children  learned  to  listen  to  the 
thrilling  story  of  escape,  and  tell  no  tale  to  their 
schoolfellows ;  United  States  marshals  found  new 
need  for  wit  and  experience  in  evading  the  law  they 
executed.  Such  action,  in  the  midst  of  such  pre 
vailing  sentiment,  inevitably  brought  mobs  in  its 
train,  —  frequent,  frightful,  and  often  bloody.  Edi 
tors,  clergymen,  substantial  citizens,  who  dared  to 
show  their  anti-slavery  sentiments,  did  it  knowing 
full  well  the  result.  Mob  after  mob  destroyed  their 
property,  insulted  their  wives,  threw  them  into  prison 
for  months  and  sometimes  years;  and  the  sufferers 
had  no  redress  in  law  or  public  sentiment.  Once 
such  a  mob  attacked  a  meeting  of  an  anti-slavery 
society  in  Boston,  and  dragged  its  orator,  William 
Lloyd  Garrison,  through  the  streets  with  a  halter 
round  his  neck.  Suddenly  coming  upon  this  ghastly 
outrage,  the  young  Sumner  was  stirred  in  his  soul, 
and  with  little  thought  of  consequences,  rushed  to 
the  rescue.  Doubtless  he  remembered  this  scene  of 
years  before  in  days  when  the  impulse  grew  strong 
within  him  to  take  up  the  cause  of  the  oppressed, 
and  helped  on  "by  all  conspiring  influences,  by  per 
sonal  feeling  and  public  action,  at  last  grew  too 
strong  to  be  denied. 


62  CHARLES  SUMNER. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

1850,  .1851. 

ENTRANCE   INTO   POLITICS. FIRST   ELECTION  TO   THE 

SENATE. 

WHAT  was  true  of  the  whole  North  was  specially 
true  in  Massachusetts,  where  the  anti-slavery  cause 
gained  rapidly  in  numbers  and  in  weight.  Indeed, 
it  was  fast  gaining  a  large  proportion  of  that  great 
force  in  any  community,  the  men  whose  opinions  on 
moral  questions  are  true  and  firm ;  and  to  those  men 
of  that  time  slavery  was  taking  on  overwhelming  im 
portance,  for  the  new  arrogance  in  the  South  was 
meeting  a  new  earnestness  in  the  North. 

The  passage  of  the  Fugitive  Slave  bill  in  1850 
excited  Massachusetts  to  the  verge  of  revolution. 
This  last  outrage  on  the  principles  of  the  North  and 
those  state  rights  which  the  South  claimed  so  vehe 
mently,  this  practical  declaration  that  the  national 
government  itself  was  committed  to  slavery,  at  last 
roused  the  whole  community.  The  lukewarm  were 
convinced,  the  men  of  conviction  were  exasperated, 
the  indifferent  excited.  At  this  juncture  a  public 
meeting  was  called  at  Faneuil  Hall  to  protest  against 
a  measure  so  iniquitous,  and  Sumner  was  its  orator. 
'  He  rarely  made  a  greater  speech  ;  full  of  fire,  it  glows 


ENTRANCE  INTO  POLITICS.  63 

with  the  white  heat  of  moral  enthusiasm,  for  at  last 
all  the  powers  of  his  being  were  involved.  He  had 
found  the  necessary  motive  and  the  whole  force  of 
his  great  powers  was  given  to  the  work.  His  humanity 
was  enlisted,  his  moral  nature  urged  him  on  irresis 
tibly,  and  his  personal  ambition  was  standing  behind 
the  rest,  though  for  the  time  being  it  was  swallowed 
up  in  the  deeper  motives.  All  his  learning  appeared 
but  as  a  background  to  his  argument ;  all  his  know 
ledge  of  the  world  but  gave  point  to  his  sarcasm ;  all 
his  elegant  associations  but  enhanced  the  force  of  his 
advocacy  of  the  slaved  His  gestures  are  described  as 
graceful,  animated,  and  often  vehement ;  his  manner 
was  so  captivating  that  men  and  women  who  listened 
to  him  still  describe  it  in  enthusiastic  phrase.  It  is 
impossible,  says  one  of  these  contemporaries,  "  to 
express  the  brilliancy  of  that  man  when  a  young  man, 
—  handsome,  radiant,  intensely  in  earnest  through 
conviction,  full  of  force  and  fire,  full  of  life."  With  a 
voice  whose  singularly  sweet  and  melodious  intona 
tions  still  linger  in  the  ears  of  his  hearers,  "  he  was 
like  an  archangel  with  a  spear." 

Thus  he  drew  the  unwilling  or  drove  the  unready 
before  him  ;  and  he  showered  invective  and  thundered 
denunciations  until  it  seemed  that  slavery  itself  must 
quail.  It  is  true  that  he  fought  with  battle-axe  rather 
than  cimeter,  but  his  strong  right  arm  sent  that  same 
battle-axe  cleaving  straight  through  all  defence.  In 
the  course  of  the  speech  he  thus  describes  a  famous 
painting  by  Tintoretto  :  — 

"There  is  a  legend  of  the  Church  still  living  on  the 
admired  canvas  of  a  Venetian  artist,  that  Saint  Mark, 


64  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

descending  from  the  skies  with  headlong  fury  into  the 
public  square,  broke  the  manacles  of  a  slave  in  the 
very  presence  of  the  judge  who  decreed  his  fate.  This 
is  known  as  the  Miracle  of  the  Slave;  and  grandly  has 
Art  illumined  the  scene.  Should  Massachusetts  here 
after  in  an  evil  hour  be  desecrated  by  any  such  decree, 
may  the  good  Evangelist  once  more  descend  with  valiant 
arm  to  break  the  manacles  of  the  slave !  " 

The  beauty  of  the  figure  touched  the  public  heart, 
and  in  after  years  Sumner  loved  to  dwell  upon  the 
effect  it  produced,  as  he  showed  his  guests  a  copy  of 
the  painting  hanging  in  his  dining-room  at  Washing 
ton,  and  related  this  incident,  frequently  adding,  "That 
picture  made  me  senator."  Certainly  this  speech  did 
much  toward  that  end. 

Not  all  the  and- slavery  men  in  Massachusetts  had 
gone  into  the  Free-Soil  party,  but  it  had  gathered 
in  the  more  radical,  and  perhaps  it  may  be  said,  for 
the  most  part  the  less  experienced,  to  such  extent  as 
to  give  it  the  balance  of  power  in  the  disturbed  and 
divided  condition  of  state  politics.  Henry  Wilson, 
just  then  editing  a  Free-Soil  newspaper  in  Boston,  saw 
that  this  was  not  only  their  opportunity,  but  with  the 
eye  of  a  prophet  discerned  its  national  value.  He 
saw  that  it  was  possible  for  the  anti-slavery  men  to 
elect  a  United  States  Senator,  and  he  realized  the 
pre-eminent  value  of  such  a  course  to  the  cause  of 
freedom.  If  Sumner  had  the  genius  of  enthusiasm, 
Wilson  had  equally  the  genius  of  sagacity.  If  the  one 
was  inspiration  to  the  weak,  counsellor  for  the  per 
plexed,  philosopher,  the  prophet  of  a  great  cause,  — 
the  other  was  sight  to  the  blind,  hands  and  brain  for 


ENTRANCE  INTO  POLITICS.  65 

the  inefficient  and  ignorant,  guide  and  leader  in  the 
most  difficult  places.  What  one  did,  was  by  its  very 
nature  done  in  the  public  eye ;  but  the  other  silently, 
and  often  working  through  other  men,  brought  about 
the  results  both  desired.  Each  did  his  own  work  in 
his  own  way ;  but  together  in  purpose  from  the  begin 
ning,  and  together  in  position  and  opportunity  for 
long  years,  these  two  men  made  Massachusetts  a  chief 
power  in  the  struggle,  a  large  factor  in  the  result. 

It  did  not  seem  to  everybody  around  him  that  in 
his  efforts  for  the  election  of  a  senator  Mr.  Wilson 
was  wise  in  his  desire,  or  practical  in  his  method. 
But  sure  that  another  anti-slavery  man  in  the  Senate 
for  six  years  would  be  an  inestimable  gain,  he  deter 
mined  to  accomplish  it  by  the  sacrifice  of  everything 
at  home ;  and  through  a  series  of  political  move 
ments  as  masterly  as  they  were  extraordinary,  he 
brought  about  the  political  combination  known  as  the 
"  Coalition,"  by  which  the  leading  state  offices,  and 
the  place  of  senator  for  Webster's  brief  unexpired 
term,  should  be  given  to  the  Democrats,  on  condition 
that  the  two  parties  unite  in  choosing  the  Free-Soil 
candidate  as  senator  for  the  long  term.  This  was  by 
no  means  a  simple  combination,  for  the  more  than 
four  hundred  members  of  the  Legislature  who  were 
eventually  to  bring  about  this  result  must  be  chosen 
by  a  combination  of  Free-Soilers  and  Democrats, 
under  conditions  varying  in  each  locality;  but  be 
lieving  the  cause  of  freedom  the  first  consideration, 
Henry  Wilson  and  the  determined  men  who  fought 
with  him  everywhere  held  to  the  one  idea  of  free-soil, 
and  would  have  no  less.  They  fixed  upon  Sumner  for 
5 


66  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

their  candidate  for  senator,  as  one  who  combined 
several  necessary  qualities.  He  was  an  uncompromis 
ing  opponent  of  slavery ;  he  was  already  one  of  the 
Free-Soil  party  at  such  cost  to  himself  as  to  add  the 
martyr  element  to  his  other  qualities ;  he  was  young, 
brilliant,  attractive,  and  represented  that  element  of 
cultivation  and  learning  always  greatly  effective  in 
Massachusetts,  and  specially  necessary  against  the 
aristocratic  Winthrop ;  and,  above  all,  he  was  as  yet 
so  slightly  identified  with  any  party  that  all  could 
unite  on  him.  Said  the  "Commonwealth,"  the  organ 
of  the  Free-Soilers  :  — 

"  Mr.  Suraner  was  selected  as  the  candidate  for  the 
Senate  because  while  true  as  the  truest  to  Free-Soil 
principles,  he  was  supposed  to  be  less  obnoxious  than 
any  prominent  Free-Soiler  in  the  state  to  the  Demo 
cratic  party.  He  was  never  identified  with  any  of  the  mea 
sures  of  the  Whig  party  except  those  relating  to  slavery. 
He  never  entered  a  Whig  state  convention  except  to 
sustain  the  sentiment,  not  of  the  Whig  party  alone,  but 
of  Massachusetts,  against  the  annexation  of  Texas  and 
the  Mexican  War." 

But  against  him  were  the  friends  of  Winthrop,  the 
friends  of  Webster,  and  many  other  elements  of  di 
vision;  for  the  Coalition  was  the  occasion  of  much 
dissension  in  both  parties.  The  Legislature  itself 
proved  a  very  disappointing  body.  Although  it 
speedily  carried  out  one  half  the  bargain,  and  chose 
the  Democrats  George  S.  Boutwell  and  Robert  Ran- 
toul  for  governor  and  senator  until  March  4,  and 
divided  the  other  state  offices  between  the  parties, 
it  could  not  be  persuaded  to  elect  Charles  Sum- 


FIRST  ELECTION  TO    THE  SENATE,        67 

ner  for  the  long  term  over  Robert  C.  Winthrop,  the 
Whig  candidate. 

For  three  months  the  fight  continued,  with  able  gen 
eralship  and  skilful  manipulating  of  men  and  caucuses 
by  the  Free-Soilers,  with  conferences  among  the 
leaders  sometimes  held  in  Sumner's  office,  with  secret 
wires  pulled  in  more  than  one  quarter,  and  with  much 
other  manoeuvring  common  to  political  action.  It  was 
probably  due  to  Henry  Wilson  more  than  to  any  other 
man  or  influence  that  at  last,  on  the  24th  of  April, 
Sumner  was  elected  by  a  secret  ballot  which  gave 
him  exactly  the  requisite  number  of  votes.  And  it 
was  a  striking  commentary  on  the  state  of  men's 
minds,  even  in  Massachusetts,  that  not  until  the  Coali 
tion  succeeded  in  passing  a  resolution  that  the  ballot 
should  be  secret  could  they  secure  the  one  last  vote 
necessary ;  but  on  the  first  secret  ballot  some  Whig 
changed  his  vote  and  elected  Sumner.  In  his  letter 
accepting  the  office  of  senator,  Sumner  makes  much  of 
the  fact  that  it  was  an  unsought  honour  thrust  upon 
him,  —  an  opinion  he  always  held,  and  frequently  re 
peated  on  the  occasion  of  his  re-elections.  It  is, 
however,  hardly  an  open  question  whether  that  can 
properly  be  called  an  "  unsought  honour  "  for  which  a 
man  is  the  willing -candidate  of  a  group  of  managers 
planning  diligently  and  working  unceasingly,  and  who 
himself  enters  often  and  anxiously  into  those  plans. 
And  his  view  of  the  matter  illustrates  many  of  Sum 
ner's  characteristics,  especially  his  constant  blindness 
to  his  obligations  to  other  men,  so  that  he  honestly 
believed  his  many  honours  always  unsought,  and  often 
undesired. 


68  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

The  Thirty-second  Congress  was  already  in  the 
midst  of  its  work  when  Sumner  took  his  seat  in  the 
Senate.  He  did  not  find  himself  the  only  representa 
tive  of  the  cause  he  had  at  heart.  In  the  House  of 
Representatives  the  ex-President,  John  Quincy  Adams, 
had  begun  the  battle  long  before,  leaving  it  to  Palfrey, 
Joshua  Giddings,  and  others  of  like  temper,  who,  in  less 
conspicuous  place  than  some  since  thought  heroes, 
worked  without  applause  and  often  without  gratitude, 
and  prepared  the  way  for  other  men  to  triumph.  In 
the  Senate  John  P.  Hale,  William  H.  Seward,  Salmon 
P.  Chase,  awaited  him,  "  slighted,  feared,  respected," 
soldiers  who  had  already  fought  many  a  battle  which 
Sumner  in  his  dilettante  days  had  scarcely  heard  of. 
Under  every  stress  of  temptation  they  had  stood  firm, 
every  inch  of  ground  which  it  seemed  possible  to  wrest 
from  slavery  they  had  besieged,  and  now  and  then 
victory  had  lingered  with  them  for  a  moment.  But 
as  yet  victory  was  only  their  acquaintance,  not  their 
companion.  Some  things  had  been  won,  as  we  have 
seen.  The  right  of  petition  was  secure ;  the  slave- 
trade  was  abolished  under  the  shadow  of  the  Capitol ; 
the  principle  was  at  least  temporarily  established  that 
each  new  state  should  decide  the  matter  for  itself: 
if  Texas  and  New  Mexico  were  slave  territory,  Cali 
fornia  and  Oregon  were  free.  But  these  crumbs  from 
the  table  of  Freedom  were  all ;  and  on  the  other  hand, 
the  law  was  everywhere  encroaching  rapidly  on  the 
free  territory,  the  whole  business  interests  of  the 
country  were  subservient  to  the  cotton-fields,  the 
fugitive  slave  was  nowhere  safe  from  the  hand  of 
the  law  on  American  soil,  and  his  friends  were  in 


FIRST  ELECTION  TO    THE  SENA  TE.         69 

equal  peril  of  goods  and  life.  Moreover,  the  slight 
protections  still  possessed  by  Freedom,  or  hardly 
gained  in  her  behalf,  were  in  constant  and  fearful 
jeopardy. 

Against  what  stress  of  governmental  influence  those 
slight  concessions  had  been  gained,  is  perhaps  best 
shown  by  an  analysis  of  the  government  itself,  made 
only  a  few  years  later  by  (let  it  be  noticed)  a  British 
observer.  According  to  this  Englishman,  in  1857,  at 
a  time  when  the  total  number  of  voters  exceeded  three 
millions,  and  the  population  dependent  upon  them  was 
five  times  as  great,  the  slaveholders  and  their  families 
numbered  but  three  hundred  and  fifty  thousand ;  and 
yet  this  fraction,  greatly  less  than  one  tenth  of  the 
voters,  had  chosen  eleven  out  of  the  sixteen  Presidents, 
who  were  themselves  slaveholders,  with  three  of  the 
remnant  entirely  under  their  influence.  In  the  legis 
lative  branch  the  slaveholders  had  named  sixty-one 
out  of  seventy-seven  Presidents  of  the  Senate,  and 
twenty-one  out  of  thirty-three  Speakers  of  the  House. 
Nor  was  the  judiciary  free  from  this  predominating 
influence,  since  here  the  South  had  furnished  seven 
teen  out  of  twenty-eight  Supreme  Court  Judges,  and 
filled  the  Attorney- General's  office  fifteen  times  out  of 
twenty.  It  is  hardly  possible  to  make  a  more  graphic 
presentation  of  the  situation  of  the  United  States  when 
you  realize  that  in  every  direction,  commercial,  politi 
cal,  national,  moral,  slavery  was  the  crucial  question 
in  American  affairs,  and  discover  that  on  this  ques 
tion  the  control  was  so  completely  in  the  hands  of 
the  South. 

In  1850,  just  before  Charles  Sumner  stepped  upon 


70  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

the  scene,  the  slaveholders  were  at  the  height  of  their 
power ;  Taylor,  and  afterward  Fillmore,  were  in  the  ex 
ecutive  chair,  at  the  beck  and  call  of  the  South,  whose 
votes  had  decided  their  election.  In  the  House  that 
high-priest  of  slavery,  Howell  Cobb,  was  Speaker. 
Yet  even  then  all  was  not  as  fair  as  it  seemed ;  the 
administration  was  in  power  by  reason  of  secret 
Northern  influence,  and  Cobb  was  only  elected  by 
a  change  in  the  requirements  for  the  election  after 
fifty-two  ballots,  and  Clay  had  been  able  to  pass  his 
famous  Omnibus  bill  only  because  it  was  a  general 
compromise.  The  concessions  to  the  North  were  spe 
cious,  it  is  true  ;  but  they  showed  the  growing  power  of 
a  sentiment  which  made  some  concession  necessary. 
Yet  with  all  this  slumbering  fire  ready  to  wake  to  new 
and  violent  action,  Benton  said  to  Sumner,  "  You  come 
upon  the  stage  too  late,  sir;  the  great  issues  are  all 
settled."  Perhaps  it  was  not  strange  that  this  giant 
of  a  passing  generation  felt  that  the  day  of  large 
things  in  men  and  measures  was  gone ;  Clay  and 
Webster  and  Calhoun  left  no  successors  then  or  after 
ward,  and  the  new  generation  was  but  just  beginning. 
But  in  that  present,  around  the  new  Senator  stood 
Cass  and  Stephen  A.  Douglas  and  Buchanan,  Jefferson 
Davis  and  Mason  and  Hunter,  —  towers  of  strength 
each  of  them,  and  all  of  them  his  enemies.  Only 
those  famous  three  defended  liberty,  —  Seward, 
Chase,  and  Hale. 

Much  is  made  by  Sumner's  admirers  of  the  fact 
that  he  sprang  full-armed  into  the  fight,  stepping 
from  private  life  into  the  Senate,  and  taking  a  promi 
nent  place  there.  But  it  must  be  remembered  that 


FIRST  ELECTION  TO    THE  SENATE.        71 

he  did  not  spring  into  the  Senate,  but  he  rather  strug 
gled  in,  drawn  thither  indeed  after  a  very  common 
place  fashion,  and  over  a  long  and  hard  road  which 
other  men  built ;  and  once  there,  his  prominence 
was  the  prominence  of  a  forlorn  hope.  He  was  fully 
fifteen  years  older  than  most  men  when  they  enter 
political  life,  and  that  fifteen  years  had  been  years  of 
a  special  and  peculiar  preparation  for  the  unique  work 
which  he  did,  and  which  no  one  else  was  equally 
fitted  to  do.  Indeed,  he  was  a  failure  in  the  usual 
and  proper  work  of  a  legislator,  —  that  of  making 
laws,  —  and  except  for  the  special  need  for  which  he 
was  especially  fitted,  his  career  would  scarcely  have 
been  the  success  it  was ;  for  the  doctrinaire  quality  so 
conspicuous  in  his  work,  and  often  so  fatal  to  it,  was 
attributable,  not  alone  to  his  temperament,  but  largely 
to  this  very  lack  of  early  experience  in  smaller  and  less 
important  legislative  bodies.  This,  which  some  would 
fain  make  his  great  title  to  glory,  was  in  fact  and  deed 
the  reason  for  many  of  his  mistakes.  He  was  fortu 
nate,  moreover,  in  the  time  of  his  public  life.  Neither 
his  mind  nor  his  training  fitted  him  for  the  consid 
eration  of  economic  questions ;  but  he  lived  in  a  day 
when  principles  were  the  great  concern,  and  methods 
were  almost  forgotten. 

In  a  letter  congratulating  him,  Theodore  Parker  said, 
"  You  once  told  me  you  were  not  in  politics,  but  in 
morals ;  now  I  hope  you  will  show  morals  in  politics." 
And  this  was  indeed  his  mission,  —  the  upholding  of 
the  moral  element  in  political  action ;  just  this,  for  his 
efforts  to  carry  out  his  principles  were  abortive  and 
fruitless.  The  expression  of  morals  in  political  action 


72  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

he  did  not  understand  and  could  not  accomplish ; 
but  his  insight  was  certain,  his  vision  clear,  his  voice 
true.  "  To  him  the  duties  of  life  were  more  than  life." 
He  has  been  called  the  "  scholar  in  politics  ;  "  but  this 
is  no  proper  characterization  of  his  point  of  view,  for  it 
was  not  as  a  scholar  that  he  was  influential,  and  his 
great  learning  was  only  a  tool  to  accomplish  his  ob 
ject.  His  it  was  to  see  the  moral  idea  under  the 
confusions  and  distractions  of  affairs,  to  uphold  it 
with  learning  and  eloquence  and  "  a  sublime  tenacity 
of  righteousness,"  until  listening  multitudes  were  in 
spired  with  this  same  high  standard  and  great  purpose. 
He  declared  in  that  speech  in  Faneuil  Hall :  — 

"  Nothing  can  be  settled  which  is  not  right.  Nothing 
can  be  settled  which  is  against  freedom.  Nothing  can 
be  settled  which  is  contrary  to  divine  law.  God,  Nature, 
and  all  the  holy  sentiments  of  the  heart  repudiate  any 
such  false,  seeming  settlement.  Amidst  the  shifts  and 
changes  of  party  our  DUTIES  remain,  pointing  the  way 
to  action.  By  no  subtle  compromise  or  adjustment  can 
men  suspend  the  commandments  of  God.  By  no  trick 
of  managers,  no  hocus-pocus  of  politicians,  no  mush  of 
concession,  can  we  be  released  from  this  obedience.  It 
is,  then,  in  the  light  of  duties  that  we  are  to  find  peace 
for  our  country  and  ourselves.  Nor  can  -any  settlement 
promise  peace  which  is  not  in  harmony  with  those  ever 
lasting  principles  from  which  our  duties  spring!  " 

It  was  in  discovering  and  in  enunciating  these  the 
principles  of  everlasting  right  in  a  time  when  good 
men  and  true  were  blind  and  deaf,  in  shouting  such 
clarion  calls  to  those  who  sat  idly  at  ease,  and  de 
claring  such  stern  tests  to  the  wavering,  that  Sumner 
found  his  mission  and  his  work.  His  great  learning 


FIRST  ELECTION  TO    THE  SENATE.        73 

and  his  experience  of  courts  and  parliaments  united 
to  enable  him  to  substantiate  his  own  position  and 
settle  that  of  others ;  his  cultivation  gave  him  grace, 
and  his  moral  enthusiasm  gave  him  power;  but  the 
result  of  his  work  was  determined  by  other  men  of 
less  conspicuous  parts,  though  of  equal  value  to  their 
generation  and  their  country. 


74  CHARLES  SUMNER. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 
1851,  1852. 

FUGITIVE   SLAVE   BILL. SPEECH,  "  FREEDOM   NATIONAL  ; 

SLAVERY    SECTIONAL." 

FROM  this  time  Charles  Sumner's  personal  life  was 
merged  in  the  larger  life  of  the  nation ;  and  it  is  of 
less  importance  what  relation  his  experiences  bore 
to  his  own  career  than  their  broader  relation  to  the 
country  and  the  time.  The  long  period  of  prepa 
ration  was  over,  and  that  of  achievement  begun. 
Whether  well  or  ill  prepared,  the  man  was  ready,  and 
the  hour  was  calling  for  him. 

For  various  reasons,  the  Fugitive  Slave  law  be 
came  the  test  and  turning-point  of  action  and  senti 
ment.  During  the  weeks  occupied  by  Massachusetts 
in  the  senatorial  contest,  there  occurred  in  Boston 
the  two  famous  instances  of  its  enforcement,  —  the 
capture  and  rescue  of  Shadrach,  and  the  rendition 
of  Simms,  —  which  made  not  only  Massachusetts, 
but  the  whole  nation,  either  advocates  or  opponents 
of  the  measure.  The  first  became  the  occasion  of 
congressional  and  presidential  interference,  much 
fierce  and  angry  debate  in  the  Senate,  and  still 
greater  public  excitement.  The  last,  with  its  osten 
tatious  display  of  force  and  its  tyrannical  control 


FUGITIVE  SLAVE  BILL.  75 

of  all  the  processes  of  law,  on  the  one  side,  and  on 
the  other  the  fruitless  appearance  of  the  ablest  and 
most  distinguished  sons  of  Massachusetts  in  behalf 
of  the  slave,  —  not  only  in  the  court-room,  but  lead 
ing  the  mob  as  well,  —  excited  the  North  to  an 
unheard-of  indignation.  Sumner  himself  at  first  took 
no  open  part  in  the  struggle,  lest  he  endanger  his 
chances  in  the  pending  election;  but  his  sympathy 
and  counsel  were  not  wanting,  and  in  the  later  strug 
gle  he  appeared  for  Simms.  These  things  were  not 
done  in  a  corner ;  and  they  served  not  only  to  inten 
sify  the  feeling  throughout  the  North,  but  they  had 
a  still  more  valuable  effect  in  concentrating  the  anti- 
slavery  sentiment  and  fixing  it  upon  a  definite  point, 
which  thus  became  the  already  abhorred  Fugitive 
Slave  bill. 

The  debate  in  the  Senate  followed  the  lines  of 
division  apparent  throughout  the  country ;  opinions 
followed  wishes  in  this,  as  in  everything  else.  Among 
the  pro-slavery  men,  some  believed  in  the  extreme 
doctrine  of  state  rights,  and  would  have  states  and 
territories  both  let  alone  to  determine  their  own. 
affairs.  These  looked  forward  with  no  regret  to  the 
two  distinct  nations  which  inevitably  must  result,  or 
sometimes  openly 'advocated  the  separation.  Others 
were  for  the  Union;  but  they  believed  that  peace 
would  reign  and  the  country  flourish  only  where  busi 
ness  principles  were  adopted  and  business  interests 
considered,  and  the  South  left  to  follow  her  own 
fashion,  while  the  North  went  her  way.  These  were 
the  men  who  believed  in  the  Missouri  Compromise. 
Still  a  third  section  —  the  controlling  and  growing 


7  6  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

element  —  felt  that  the  nation  itself  must  be  finally 
committed  to  slavery ;  and  while  the  Northern  states 
could  not  be  forced  to  permit  it  within  their  own 
borders,  they  must,  in  a  hopeless  and  permanent 
minority,  see  the  nation  adopt  slavery  as  its  own  in 
all  new  states,  and  permit  the  slaveholder  to  exercise 
everywhere  the  rights  native  to  his  own  soil.  The 
anti-slavery  ranks  were  no  less  divided.  There  were 
those  who  violently  declared  for  disunion,  that  free 
dom  might  no  longer  be  defined  bondage ;  there 
were  those  who,  like  their  neighbours  in  the  South, 
held  the  Union  in  first  place;  and  some  for  love 
of  country  looked  to  a  peaceful  division  that  should 
yet  leave  the  states  united ;  and  some  felt  that  peace 
was  more  necessary  than  freedom,  and  prosperity  the 
first  need.  But  all,  eager  South  and  anxious  North, 
alike  believed  that  the  Constitution  permitted  slavery 
in  the  nation,  and  only  the  states  could  make  men 
free. 

The  Fugitive  Slave  act  bore  directly  on  this  point 
in  a  somewhat  contradictory  fashion.  The  North 
saw  in  it  an  attempt  to  force  slavery  as  a  national 
measure,  and  thus  an  interference  by  legal  methods 
with  the  control  of  the  Northern  states  over  their 
own  aifairs.  The  South,  from  a  different  point  of 
view,  considered  the  active  resistance  to  its  enforce 
ment  by  the  best  men  of  Ohio  and  Pennsylvania, 
New  York  and  Massachusetts,  a  violation  of  the 
right  of  the  Southern  states  over  their  own  prop 
erty  and  a  direct  defiance  of  national  authority. 
Thus  on  both  sides  this  law  resulted  in  sharply  de 
fining  the  issue.  The  North  began  forthwith  to 


FUGITIVE  SLAVE  BILL.  77 

exercise  itself  as  to  its  position.  Could  the  Con 
stitution  be  obeyed  and  runaway  slaves  set  free? 
Many  a  sober-minded  anti- slavery  man  could  see  no 
way  to  answer  yes,  while  many  a  Garrison  Abolitionist 
hoped  the  South  had  forced  the  North  to  disunion. 
For  men  of  a  conservative  temper  it  was  a  serious 
dilemma,  since  the  question  of  the  enforcement  of 
this  law  was  made  a  sort  of  shibboleth  by  both  sides. 
It  was  at  this  point  in  the  contest  that  Sumner 
entered  upon  the  discussion,  and  performed  at  the 
very  outset  one  of  the  greatest  of  his  legislative  ser 
vices  in  a  speech  on  this  measure.  He  had  been 
eight  months  in  the  Senate,  and  his  Free-Soil  con 
stituents  were  alarmed  at  his  silence  on  the  all- 
important  question.  In  private  and  in  public  they 
remonstrated  with  him ;  and  as  ignorant  of  the  social 
as  of  the  parliamentary  situation,  they  imagined  their 
advocate  was  beguiled  into  his  old  indifference  by  the 
attractions  of  society  at  the  capital.  Land  grants 
in  Iowa  and  cheap  ocean  postage  were  by  no  means 
the  questions  they  sent  him  to  Washington  to  discuss. 
They  failed  to  see  the  significance  of  the  Senate's 
action  when  it  voted  down  his  memorial  on  the  Fugi 
tive  Slave  bill,  or ,  refused  by  a  two- thirds  vote  to 
listen  to  him  at  all.  Nor  were  they  satisfied  by  his 
devotion  to  the  cause  of  Drayton  and  Sayres,  the 
unfortunate  officers  of  the  schooner  "Pearl,"  who 
were  cast  into  the  filthy  Washington  jail  for  an  at 
tempt  to  carry  away  from  that  city  a  cargo  of  run 
away  slaves.  Indicted  on  one  hundred  and  fifteen 
counts,  these  men  suffered  four  years  of  durance  more 
vile  than  can  now  be  imagined.  After  Mr.  Sumner 


7 8  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

came  to  Washington,  he  was  their  never-failing  friend 
and  almost  daily  visitor.  In  May,  1851,  he  delivered 
an  elaborate  and  learned  legal  opinion  to  President 
Fillmore,  which  furnished  a  basis  for  their  pardon 
a  year  afterward.  Thereupon  the  Senator  himself 
arranged  their  departure  from  jail  more  after  the 
manner  of  an  escape  than  a  legal  deliverance,  send 
ing  them  to  Baltimore  in  a  carriage  by  night.  What 
soever  he  might,  thus  and  otherwise,  Sumner  did 
for  the  cause,  which  by  this  time  had  taken  entire 
possession  of  him ;  but  in  the  Senate  he  might  not. 
By  every  device  of  rule  or  order  unfamiliar  to  the 
clumsy  hand  of  the  untrained  parliamentarian,  by 
every  tyranny  possible  to  a  majority  (which  was  often 
forty-seven  to  four),  the  new  Senator  was  prevented 
from  speaking ;  and  it  was  only  when  he  had  served 
his  belated  apprenticeship,  and  learned  how  to  man 
age  the  situation  himself,  that  he  was  able  to  touch 
the  tabooed  subject,  and  that  only  five  days  before 
the  close  of  the  session.  An  apparently  innocent 
amendment  was  offered  to  the  appropriation  bill  pro 
viding  for  the  salaries  of  the  civil  officers  of  the 
government.  This  amendment  levied  a  special  tax 
upon  the  several  judicial  districts,  to  defray  any 
"  extraordinary  expenses "  which  might  have  been 
incurred  in  executing  the  laws  therein,  and  was  in 
tended  to  cover  the  "  extraordinary  expense "  of 
capturing  fugitive  slaves  in  Northern  states.  To  this 
Mr.  Sumner  immediately  offered  another  amendment 
in  these  words :  "  Provided  that  no  such  allowance 
shall  be  authorized  for  any  expenses  incurred  in  exe 
cuting  the  Act  of  September  18,  1850,  for  the  sur- 


SPEECH,  " FREEDOM  NATIONAL,"  ETC.       79 

render  of  fugitives  from  service  or  labour :  which  said 
Act  is  hereby  repealed."  Upon  this  amendment 
he  spoke  for  nearly  four  hours.  The  keynote  of 
the  speech  was  struck  in  this  almost  its  opening 
paragraph :  — 

"Painfully  convinced  of  the  unutterable  wrong  and 
woe  of  slavery;  profoundly  believing  that  according 
to  the  true  spirit  of  the  Constitution  and  the  sentiments 
of  the  Fathers  it  can  find  no  place  under  bur  National 
Government ;  that  it  is  in  every  respect  sectional,  and 
in  no  respect  National;  that  it  is  always  and  every 
where  creature  and  dependent  of  the  States,  and  never 
anywhere  creature  or  dependent  of  the  Nation,  and  that 
the  Nation  can  never  by  legislative  or  other  act  impart 
to  it  any  support,  under  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States,  —  with  these  convictions  I  could  not  allow  this 
session  to  reach  its  close  without  making  or  seizing 
an  opportunity  to  declare  myself  openly  against  the 
usurpation,  injustice,  and  cruelty  of  the  late  intolerable 
enactment  for  the  recovery  of  the  fugitive  slaves." 

This  was  not  the  first  time  Sumner  had  promul 
gated  his  great  idea  that  slavery  was  sectional,  and 
freedom  national.  It  was  more  than  suggested  in 
the  speech  in  which  he  vainly  endeavoured  to  per 
suade  the  Massachusetts  Whigs  and  their  leader, 
Webster,  to  declare  against  slavery  in  1846.  Nor 
was  it  an  altogether  new  idea  to  Congress  and  the 
country.  Ten  years  before,  Joshua  Giddings  had 
offered  a  resolution  in  the  House  of  Representatives 
that  freedom  was  a  natural  right,  and  slavery  only  a 
municipal  regulation ;  and  again,  in  the  Free-Soil  con 
vention  at  Pittsburgh,  only  a  fortnight  before  this 


8o  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

time,  this  same  veteran  prepared  a  platform  which 
declared  that  "  Slavery  is  sectional,  and  Freedom 
national."  But  notwithstanding  these  scarcely  no 
ticed  declarations,  it  was  an  idea  very  novel  to 
congressional  ears.  Pro- slavery  advocates  of  the 
sacredness  of  the  Constitution  were  not  used  to  hear 
their  measures  declared  a  "  usurpation,"  and  Demo 
crat  and  Whig  had  just  joined  hands  publicly  to  an 
nounce  that  the  Constitution  was  finally  interpreted, 
the  statute  finally  settled  as  to  slavery.  In  ringing 
words,  this  new  champion  for  freedom  threw  down 
his  gauntlet  on  that  field.  Said  he  :  — 

"  Convictions  of  the  heart  cannot  be  repressed.  Utter 
ances  of  conscience  must  be  heard.  They  break  forth  with 
irrepressible  might.  As  well  attempt  to  check  the  tides 
of  ocean,  the  currents  of  the  Mississippi,  or  the  rushing 
waters  of  Niagara.  The  discussion  of  slavery  will  pro 
ceed  wherever  two  or  three  are  gathered  together, — by 
the  fireside,  on  the  highway,  at  the  public  meeting,  in  the 
church.  The  movement  against  slavery  is  from  the  Ever 
lasting  Arm.  Even  now  it  is  gathering  its  forces,  soon 
to  be  felt  everywhere.  It  may  not  be  felt  yet  in  the  high 
places  of  office  and  power;  but  all  who  can  put  their  ears 
humbly  to  the  ground  will  hear  and  comprehend  its  in 
cessant  and  advancing  tread." 

He  repeated  his  main  argument  in  these  words : 

"  The  relations  of  the  National  Government  to  slavery, 
though  plain  and  obvious,  are  constantly  misunderstood. 
A  popular  belief  at  this  moment  makes  slavery  a  National 
institution,  and  of  course  renders  its  support  a  National 
duty.  The  extravagance  of  this  error  can  hardly  be  sur 
passed.  An  institution  which  our  fathers  most  carefully 
omitted  to  name  in  the  Constitution,  which  according  to 


SPEECH,   "FREEDOM  NATIONAL?   ETC.       8 1 

the  debates  in  the  convention  they  refused  to  cover  with 
any  '  sanction,'  and  which  at  the  original  organization  of 
the  government  was  merely  sectional,  existing  nowhere 
on  Arational  territory,  is  now,  above  all  things,  blazoned 
as  National." 

He  presented  his  subject  under  two  heads  :  — 

"  First,  the  true  relations  of  the  National  Government 
to  slavery,  wherein  it  will  appear  that  there  is  no  National 
fountain  from  which  Slavery  can  be  derived,  and  no  Na 
tional  power,  under  the  Constitution,  by  which  it  can  be 
supported.  Enlightened  by  this  general  survey,  we  shall 
be  prepared  to  consider,  secondly,  the  true  nature  of  the 
provision  for  the  rendition  of  fugitives  from  service,  and 
herein  especially  the  unconstitutional  and  offensive  legis 
lation  of  Congress  in  pursuance  thereof." 

The  first  argument  proceeded  on  the  lines,  now  so 
familiar,  that  slavery  must  be  expressly  and  positively 
recognized,  not  implied  or  inferred,  by  the  Constitu 
tion,  in  order  to  be  upheld  by  it ;  and  that  the  word 
"  person  "  in  the  Fifth  Amendment  was  used  in  its 
broadest  sense.  The  second  put  aside  with  scant 
shrift  the  claim  that  the  provision  of  Article  Four, 
which  relates  to  "  persons  held  to  service  or  labour," 
was  one  of  the  original  compromises  of  the  Consti 
tution,  and  effectually  disposed  of  the  kindred  claim 
that  this  was  one  of  the  topics  debated  by  the  fathers, 
and  at  last  only  decided  by  a  general  and  indefinite 
statement  carrying  both  interpretations  which  history 
had  justly  interpreted  in  the  kiterest  of  slavery.  He 
went  on  to  arraign  the  Fugitive  Slave  act  in  no  doubt 
ful  terms,  on  nine  different  counts,  as  contrary  to  the 
Constitution  in  act  and  inference.  But  passing  over 
6 


82  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

these  points  as  comparatively  trivial,  Sumner  boldly 
took  the  aggressive,  and  declared  this  bill  to  be  "  a 
usurpation  by  Congress  of  powers  not  granted  by  the 
Constitution,  and  an  infraction  of  rights  secured  to 
the  states ;  and  secondly,  that  it  takes  away  trial  by 
jury  in  a  question  of  personal  liberty  or  a  suit  at  com 
mon  law."  In  a  most  exhaustive  and  elaborate  fashion 
he  clothed  the  dry  bones  of  his  argument  with  the 
flesh  and  blood  of  history,  and  adorned  it  with  the 
imperial  purple  of  learning.  He  went  on  to  show 
that  this  matter  must  be  relegated  to  the  states.  And 
as  ever,  not  content  with  settling  his  theory  upon  a 
throne  of  judgment,  he  gave  it  a  soul  also,  in  an 
eloquent  appeal  to  the  moral  sentiment  and  that 
divine  law  which  is  above  all  human  enactment. 
Furthermore,  he  solemnly  declared  :  "  By  the  Supreme 
Law  which  commands  me  to  do  no  injustice,  by  the 
comprehensive  Christian  Law  of  Brotherhood,  by  the 
Constitution  which  I  have  sworn  to  support,  I  am 
bound  to  disobey  this  Act" 

It  remains  only  to  listen  to  Sumner's  own  state 
ment  of  the  implications  of  this  doctrine  to  see  the 
importance  of  the  speech.  He  said,  — 

"  In  all  national  territories  slavery  will  be  impossible. 
On  the  high  seas,  under  the  national  flag,  slavery  will 
be  impossible.  In  the  District  of  Columbia  slavery  will 
instantly  cease.  Congress  can  give  no  sanction  to  slavery 
by  the  admission  of  new  slave  States.  Nowhere  under 
the  Constitution  can  the  Nation,  by  legislation  or  other 
wise,  support  slavery,  hunt  slaves,  or  hold  property  in 
man.1' 


SPEECH,   "FREEDOM  NATIONAL?   ETC,       83 

It  was  little  wonder  that  under  an  argument  like 
this  the  friends  of  slavery  were  restive  and  its  enemies 
joyful.  We  have  given  but  its  dry  bones,  indeed ; 
but  the  beauty  and  force  of  its  oratory  may  perhaps 
be  imagined  when  its  enemies  themselves  thus  judged 
it.  "  This  is  the  first  time  in  the  course  of  my  life," 
said  one  of  the  pro-slavery  members  of  the  Senate, 
"  that  I  have  listened  to  the  whole  of  an  Abolition 
speech.  I  did  not  know  it  was  possible  that  I  could 
endure  a  speech  for  over  three  hours  upon  the  sub 
ject  of  the  Abolition  of  Slavery.  But  this  oration 
of  the  Senator  from  Massachusetts  has  been  so 
handsomely  embellished  with  poetry,  both  Latin  and 
English,  so  full  of  classical  allusions  and  rhetorical 
flourishes,  as  to  make  it  much  more  palatable  than  I 
supposed  it  could  have  been  made."  It  is  needless 
to  quote  the  full  and  appreciative  response  the  speech 
received  on  both  sides  the  water,  wherever  men 
loved  freedom  and  hated  slavery ;  but  in  one  sense 
the  most  extravagant  encomiums  were  justified.  It 
was  an  epoch-making  speech.  Spoken  to  a  wider 
audience  than  the  Senate,  it  convinced  the  doubting 
North  of  the  justice  of  the  cause  it  had  espoused, 
and  put  the  firm  and  solid  ground  of  constitutional 
right  beneath  the  feet  of  the  anti-slavery  men,  in  place 
of  the  shifting  sands  of  individual  opinion.  From 
this  time  forth  every  man  knew  that  his  public  and  his 
private  conscience  had  no  quarrel  the  one  with  the 
other,  that  the  Constitution  was  a  bond  of  freedom, 
that  the  flag  of  the  Union  was  everywhere  the  banner 
of  liberty.  The  most  conservative  no  longer  feared 
to  assert  that  the  United  States  could  not  justly  com- 


84  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

pel  one  group  of  states  to  accept  the  constitutional 
interpretation  of  a  different  group,  but  that  every 
state  and  each  man  must  interpret  that  Constitution 
for  himself;  and  further  still,  he  was  furnished  with 
standing-ground  and  weapons  when  he  declared  that 
this  Constitution  neither  directed  nor  even  sanc 
tioned  slavery.  It  was  a  long  step  forward  marked 
by  this  speech.  No  man,  not  even  Garrison  himself, 
had  yet  discovered  that  the  nation  might  —  yes, 
must  —  make  all  men  free  ;  but  that  lesson  was  writ 
ten  in  blood  and  learned  in  battle.  The  first  step 
toward  it  was  the  elementary  doctrine  that  the  na 
tion  need  not  make  any  man  a  slave,  and  this  was 
the  service  done  by  this  speech.  The  Northern 
conscience  was  set  free,  and  the  force  and  power 
resulting  therefrom  issued  in  the  Emancipation  Proc 
lamation.  It  is  true  that  the  extreme  radical  wing 
of  the  anti-slavery  party  still  held  disunion  to  be  a 
hope;  but  for  the  present  at  least,  they  welcomed 
even  a  subversive  ally  who  brought  such  strength  to 
the  cause. 

In  still  another  and  more  personal  way,  this  speech 
determined  Sumner's  position  and  work.  It  not 
only  placed  him  at  once  in  the  front  rank  of  the 
anti-slavery  cause,  but  it  defined  and  circumscribed 
his  work  there.  He  was  and  was  to  be  its  prophet, 
mighty  to  prevail  over  the  hearts  of  men,  strong 
and  fearless  to  uphold  the  truth  and  denounce  the 
wrong,  wise  in  discovering  the  eternal  laws  that 
bind  all  generations,  and  learned  in  that  philosophy 
and  experience  of  law  and  government  which  make 
a  rule  for  nations.  He  was  the  guide  and  philoso- 


SPEECH,   "FREEDOM  NATIONAL,"   ETC.       85 

pher,  the  mentor  and  prophet,  of  the  North  from 
this  day  onward,  but  never  anywhere  its  leader. 
If  Phillips  and  Garrison  were  the  fierce  John  Baptists 
of  the  gospel  of  freedom,  Sumner  was  by  no  means 
its  Saviour,  as  in  the  Liter  days  of  his  suffering  he  was 
sometimes  thought,  nor  even  the  Paul  who  built 
up  its  mighty  structure ;  but  he  was  a  new  prophet 
of  a  new  dispensation,  —  a  prophet  whose  words 
moved  men  to  mighty  deeds,  whose  learning  placed 
them  on  a  sure  foundation,  whose  high  and  strong 
and  stern  moral  sense  never  failed  to  support  and 
sustain  them.  It  was  a  most  conspicuous  service, 
and  it  has  been  sometimes  called  the  chief.  It  was 
a  service  which  cannot  be  reckoned,  and  it  has  some 
times  been  counted  of  little  worth  ;  but  it  was  neither 
the  greatest  nor  the  least.  Moral  values  cannot  be 
weighed,  nor  measured,  nor  proportioned.  It  was 
a  work  standing  all  by  itself,  —  essential,  vital,  im 
measurable.  Let  us  no  longer  try  in  childish  fashion 
to  settle  relative  values,  and  fix  standards  of  high  and 
low.  Each  man  has  done  his  own  work ;  and  from 
the  days  of  the  fathers  until  now,  the  mighty  army 
marches  abreast  to  the  conquest  of  history. 

It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  this  speech  of  Sum- 
ner's  marked  an  advance ;  but  with  the  solidification 
of  anti-slavery  sentiment  and  the  shifting  of  position 
which  followed  it,  a  further  step  on  both  sides  be 
came  necessary.  If  the  North  was  to  claim  national 
freedom  and  sectional  slavery,  the  South  must  meet 
the  issue ;  and  the  next  stage  in  the  conflict  was  the 
struggle  over  Kansas  and  Nebraska. 


86  CHARLES  SUMNER. 


CHAPTER   IX. 

1852-1856. 

POLITICAL   CONDITIONS. FIRST  TERM   IN    SENATE. 

KANSAS-NEBRASKA    STRUGGLE. PUBLIC   SPEECHES. 

THE  political  struggle  went  on  hotly.  The  fight 
for  the  presidential  nomination  was  fought  on  the 
mixed  basis  of  public  and  personal  issues ;  but  both 
parties  determined  in  solemn  resolve  and  written 
compact  to  support  no  candidate  not  pledged  to 
oppose  any  renewal  of  the  debate  on  slavery.  The 
Whigs  were  divided  between  Fillmore,  who  wished 
the  renomination,  and  Webster,  who  moved  earth 
and  defied  heaven  to  secure  the  long-coveted  prize. 
The  Democrats  were  in  like  case,  but  theirs  was  a 
triangular  duel.  Douglas,  like  Webster,  had  sacri 
ficed  himself  on  the  altar  of  slavery  to  secure  this 
nomination;  Buchanan  had  endured  or  welcomed 
all  things  to  the  same  end,  while  Cass  rightly  thought 
he  deserved  the  honour.  With  such  a  state  of  things 
in  both  great  parties  there  was  large  opportunity  for 
intrigue,  and  it  was  well  employed ;  so  that  in  the  end 
the  Whigs  chose  Scott,  and  the  Democrats  Pierce,  as 
standard-bearers.1  Both  parties  mortgaged  them- 

1  It  is  a  curious  fact  that  the  Illinois  Democrats  voted  for 
Jefferson  Davis  for  Vice-President. 


POLITICAL   CONDITIONS.  87 

selves  to  slavery,  well  assured  that  this,  and  this  alone, 
was  the  price  of  success.  But  the  little  Free -Soil 
Democratic  convention  which  nominated  John  P. 
Hale  adopted  a  platform  fiercely  denouncing  all  com 
promise,  and  declaring  slavery  a  "  sin  and  a  crime." 

In  the  campaign  which  followed,  Sumner  did  his 
share  of  the  work,  and  at  the  Massachusetts  conven 
tion  of  the  Free- Soil  party  led  the  congratulations 
with  which  that  party  hugged  to  itself  its  delusion 
that  its  attempted  punishment  of  the  Whigs  was  a 
blow  to  slavery.  In  the  summer  of  1853  he  was  also 
a  member  of  the  convention  which  revised  the  con 
stitution  of  Massachusetts.  His  service  in  that  body 
was  as  usual  along  the  line  of  principles  rather  than 
in  the  elaboration  of  methods ;  but  it  is  worth  while 
to  notice  this  episode  in  his  career,  since  it  was  the 
only  public  office  held  by  Mr.  Sumner  outside  the 
Senate. 

The  opening  of  the  first  Congress  of  Pierce's  ad 
ministration  marked  the  changed  position  of  national 
affairs  in  the  new  governmental  strength  of  the  pro- 
slavery  party,  and  the  new  strength  of  the  anti-slavery 
sentiment.  While,  a  few  years  before,  it  was  possible 
to  go  on  claiming  more  and  more  privilege  for  the  pe 
culiar  institution,  it  was  now  necessary  not  only  to  cease 
claiming  more  privilege,  but  to  defend  what  was  al 
ready  secured.  No  jot  was  abated  in  carrying  out 
the  Fugitive  Slave  law,  but  the  rather  it  was  enforced 
with  more  rigour ;  and  meanwhile  both  sides  prepared 
to  meet  the  question  of  Squatter  Sovereignty  in  the 
territory  of  Nebraska.  After  one  or  two  abortive  at 
tempts  to  precipitate  the  matter,  it  came  fairly  to  the 


88  CHARLES  SUMNER, 

front  in  the  first  weeks  of  the  Thirty-third  Congress  in 
a  bill  dividing  the  proposed  territory  into  two,  —  Ne 
braska  and  Kansas.  And  therewith  began  a  struggle 
which  ended  only  with  the  admission  of  Kansas  to  the 
Union  in  1861, —  a  struggle  carried  on  unremittingly 
and  fiercely  at  Washington,  and  savagely  in  Kansas, 
which  gathered  unto  itself  those  awful  conflicts  which 
were  the  advance-guard  of  war,  and  which  to  Sumner 
personally  was  fraught  with  such  consequence.  The 
first  move  was  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compromise, 
—  a  measure  which  both  Houses  of  Congress  debated 
for  four  months  before  it  finally  passed./  Douglas  and 
Seward  and  Chase  and  Fessenden  and  Edward  Everett 
in  the  Senate,  Stephens  and  Keitt  and  Breckenridge 
and  the  Washburns,  and  Gerrit  Smith  and  Tom 
Benton  and  Banks  in  the  House,  were  some  of  the 
giants  who  shared  the  great  debate.  Strong  men  on 
both  sides  were  stirred  to  the  depths  by  the  nature  of 
the  issues  involved,  and  moved  to  the  height  of  their 
powers  by  the  breadth  and  scope  of  those  issues. 
Besides  joining  in  the  debate  from  time  to  time,  Sum 
ner  spoke  twice  at  length.  In  the  main  he  followed 
the  lines  of  his  former  speech,  showing  that  this  com 
promise  was  the  work  of  the  South,  and  declaring 
that  the  Constitution  from  the  beginning  never  sanc 
tioned  slavery,  but  only  permitted  it  within  the  bounds 
of  the  states.  At  midnight,  just  before  the  passage 
of  the  measure,  Sumner  uttered  these  memorable 
words  :  — 

"  Not  in  this  way  can  peace  come.  In  passing  such  a 
bill  as  is  now  threatened,  you  scatter  from  this  dark  mid 
night  hour  no  seeds  of  harmony  and  good-will,  but,  broad- 


POLITICAL   CONDITIONS,  89 

cast  through  the  land,  dragons'  teeth,  which  haply  may  not 
spring  up  in  direful  crops  of  armed  men,  yet  I  am  assured 
will  fructify  in  civil  strife  and  feud.  From  the  depth  of 
my  soul,  as  loyal  citizen  and  as  Senator,  I  plead,  remon 
strate,  protest,  against  the  passage  of  this  bill.  I  struggle 
against  it  as  against  death ;  but  as  in  death  itself,  corrup 
tion  puts  on  incorruption,  and  this  mortal  body  puts  on 
immortality,  so  from  the  sting  of  this  hour  I  find  assur 
ance  of  that  triumph  by  which  Freedom  will  be  restored 
to  her  immortal  birthright  in  the  Republic." 

By  a  curious  coincidence  —  or  Providence,  as  you 
will  —  the  bill  was  gaining  a  new  commentary  at  the 
very  moment  of  its  adoption.  For  the  third  time  the 
Fugitive  Slave  bill  brought  forth  a  cause  celebre  in  the 
streets  of  Boston.  Anthony  Burns  was  seized  as  a 
runaway  slave  on  the  24th  of  May,  —  the  day 
after  the  midnight  passage  of  the  Kansas-Nebraska 
bill.  Boston  was  again  rent  and  torn  with  an  excite 
ment  that  registered  the  excitement  of  the  whole 
North.  Eloquent  orators,  wrought  up  to  the  fiercest 
pitch,  urged  crowded  mass  meetings  to  armed  resist 
ance,  and  their  appeals  were  not  in  vain.  An  attempt 
at  rescue  was  made,  and  in  the  fight  that  resulted  a 
volunteer  defender  of  the  law  was  killed.  It  needed 
the  whole  police  force,  reinforced  by  the  militia  and 
by  United  States  troops  as  well,  to  keep  outraged 
Boston  from  taking  the  matter  into  her  own  hands ; 
and  when  at  last  Burns  was  taken  to  the  revenue  cut 
ter  furnished  his  master,  it  was  in  the  midst  of  a  great 
throng  of  excited  humanity  from  all  the  country 
round,  who  then  and  there  vowed  a  great  vow  against 
slavery  and  all  its  works.  Sumner  thus  described  the 


QO  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

situation  in  a  speech  before  the  Republican  State  con 
vention  in  Worcester,  three  months  later  :  — 

"  Contemporaneously  with  the  final  triumph  of  this  out 
rage  at  Washington,  another  dismal  tragedy  was  enacted 
at  Boston.  In  those  streets  where  he  had  walked  as  a 
freeman,  Anthony  Burns  was  seized  as  a  slave  under  the 
base  pretext  that  he  was  a  criminal;  imprisoned  in  the 
Court  House,  which  was  turned  for  the  time  into  fortress 
and  barracoon ;  guarded  by  heartless  hirelings  whose  chief 
idea  of  Liberty  was  license  to  wrong;  escorted  by  intrusive 
soldiers  of  the  United  States;  watched  by  a  prostitute 
militia  ;  and  finally  given  up  to  a  Slave-Hunter  by  the  de 
cree  of  a  petty  magistrate,  who  did  not  hesitate  to  take 
upon  his  soul  the  awful  responsibility  of  dooming  a  fellow- 
man,  in  whom  he  could  find  no  fault,  to  a  fate  worse  than 
death.  How  all  this  was  accomplished,  I  need  not  relate. 
Suffice  it  to  say  that  in  doing  this  deed  of  woe  and  shame, 
the  liberties  of  all  our  citizens,  white  as  well  as  black,  were 
put  in  jeopardy ;  the  Mayor  of  Boston  was  converted  to 
a  tool,  the  Governor  of  the  Commonwealth  to  a  cipher ; 
the  laws,  the  precious  sentiments,  the  religion,  the  pride 
and  glory  of  Massachusetts  were  trampled  in  the  dust; 
and  you  and  I  and  all  of  us  fell  down,  while  the  Slave 
Power  flourished  over  us." 

The  effect  of  this  arrest  was  very  great.  Three 
times  the  North  had  seen  Massachusetts  return  a 
fugitive  slave  under  pressure  of  the  United  States  law 
and  by  force  of  United  States  arms ;  but  the  indigna 
tion  had  grown  in  volume  with  each  effort,  and  burst 
forth  at  last  in  such  scorching  flame  of  legislative 
action  against  the  law  and  all  officers  who  had  en 
forced  it,  that  hereafter  "  no  one  cared  to  try  further 
experiments  in  slavecatching  on  New  England  soil," 
and  everywhere  the  law  was  weakened  beyond  recov- 


FIRST  TERM  IN  SENATE.  91 

ery.  An  angry  Senate  saw  fit  to  hold  Simmer  largely 
responsible  for  this  result,  —  and  with  something  of 
discrimination,  it  must  be  said,  although  with  some 
thing  of  injustice  as  well.  The  attack  on  the  Court 
House  in  which  Bacheller  was  killed,  occurred  the 
very  evening  of  Sumner's  speech,  and  all  over  the 
country  the  Southern  press  and  their  Northern  allies 
attributed  the  death  of  this  man  to  that  speech,  — 
wilfully  deceiving  their  readers,  knowing  as  they  did 
that  no  syllable  of  it  had  then  reached  the  North. 
The  vulgarity,  virulence,  and  violence  of  these  at 
tacks  were  beyond  belief;  and  so  unmistakable  were 
the  threats  of  personal  violence  that  Northern  men 
hastened  to  offer  their  services  as  a  guard.  But  on 
the  other  hand,  if  Sumner  was  not  directly  responsible 
for  the  death  of  this  man,  he  had  done  much  to 
inspire  the  doubting,  arouse  the  interested,  and  jus 
tify  the  halting  both  in  his  own  commonwealth  and 
all  over  the  country.  His  words  had  been  the  trum 
pet-call  to  action  and  the  bond  of  its  justification. 
He  was  gladly  responsible  for  all  that  he  had  done ; 
and  from  this  time  forth  the  antagonism  already 
aroused  in  the  Senate  broke  forth  into  active  hatred 
and  animosity.  Partly  because  he  represented  the 
most  obnoxious  of  all  the  states,  partly  by  reason  of 
what  he  had  done  and  said,  and  partly  on  account  of 
certain  personal  characteristics,  he  became  in  some 
sort  a  representative  there  of  the  anti-slavery  cause, 
and  was  henceforth  treated  accordingly.  He  himself 
felt  this,  unconsciously  sometimes,  always  with  pride, 
and  its  immediate  effect  was  a  new  tone  which  ap 
peared  in  his  speeches.  He  learned  of  the  South 


92  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

to  answer  vituperation  with  scorn,  to  meet  invective 
with  denunciation;  and  so  biting,  so  fierce,  were 
these  attacks  that  they  aroused  an  implacable  wrath 
in  all  who  felt  their  sting.  Before  Congress  had 
adjourned  in  July,  Sumner  had  himself  sowed  the 
seed  which  in  the  full  tree  furnished  Preston  Brooks 
his  bludgeon.  In  the  debates  of  this  period  the  case 
of  Anthony  Burns  made  the  text,  and  Sumner  became 
the  target  for  all  the  pent-up  hatred  against  Massa 
chusetts.  Only  those  who  have  themselves  felt  the 
brutality  of  congressional  speech  at  that  time  can  at 
all  appreciate  its  extent  and  degree.  In  formal 
speeches,  senators  did  not  hesitate  to  call  Sumner 
a  miscreant,  a  madman,  a  serpent ;  they  proposed 
his  expulsion,  and  they  both  proposed  and  executed 
the  intention  to  "  place  him  in  that  nadir  of  social 
degradation  which  he  merited."  To  such  arguments 
he  replied  with  that  intolerable  scorn  and  that  weight 
of  contempt  native  to  him.  The  fire  of  his  grand 
father,  the  cold  hardness  of  his  father,  the  indomi 
table  will  transmitted  in  New  England  blood  and 
cultivated  by  education,  his  own  sense  of  superiority, 
the  offence  of  opposition,  the  strong  support  of  a 
moral  purpose,  —  all  sent  their  separate  currents  to 
strengthen  speech  polished  by  the  customs  of  court 
iers  and  enforced  by  a  phenomenal  learning.  The 
severity  of  Sumner's  attacks  is  not  altogether  shown 
in  their  printed  form.  In  manner  as  well  as  words, 
this  Northern  miscreant,  this  Yankee,  showed  an 
absolute  and  overwhelming  scorn  and  contempt  for 
the  Southern  chivalry ;  this  was  the  insult  that  made 
injury  a  crime. 


FIRST  TERM  IN  SENA  TE.  93 

In  this  manner  and  after  this  fashion  the  debate 
went  on  in  Congress.  Slavery  was  the  all-absorbing 
topic,  and  all  other  interests  of  the  country  were  prac 
tically  laid  aside  by  common  consent  until  it  should  be 
settled  that  the  slave  was  everywhere  property,  or  de 
termined  that  a  man  was  everywhere  human.  All 
legislative  roads  led  to  this  one  centre,  slavery.  Ap 
propriation  bills  were  the  opportunity  of  both  sides ; 
bills  to  regulate  the  courts  became  a  battle-ground  ; 
the  election  of  a  clerk  of  the  House  of  Representatives 
or  the  selection  of  Senate  committees  turned  on  the 
same  question.  A  concrete  illustration  was  the  fact  that 
Sumner  himself  was  for  a  long  time  not  on  any  com 
mittee,  the  Senate  having  voted  that  he  "  was  outside 
any  healthy  political  organization,"  and  therefore  en 
titled  to  no  place  in  its  councils. 

The  manner  of  the  debate  was  as  has  been  de 
scribed,  —  great  speeches,  as  befitted  the  importance 
of  the  issue,  but  the  tone  domineering,  even  bullying ; 
the  temper  so  fiery  that  blows  were  a  common  argu 
ment.  Pistols  were  often  cocked ;  challenges  were 
common.  Long  extracts  of  the  billingsgate  actually 
employed  would  give  no  idea  of  the  angry  vitupera 
tion,  the  intolerably  insulting  manner,  which  was  then 
the  every-day  atmosphere  of  Congress.  The  genera 
tion  that  now  is  could  not  be  made  to  believe  that 
which  was  the  pride  and  glory  of  the  generation  hardly 
yet  gone  from  us,  and  therefore  the  reader  of  to-day 
cannot  altogether  realize  the  conditions  which  pre 
ceded  and  helped  to  bring  about  the  war. 

In  this  later  day  it  may  be  well  to  glance  hastily 
over  the  situation  in  Kansas  itself  for  clearer  remem- 


94  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

brance.  In  this  new  territory  there  sprang  up  an  un 
precedented  struggle  under  the  law  that  abrogated 
the  Missouri  Compromise,  —  leaving  each  state  to  de 
cide  for  itself  on  the  question  of  slavery.  Both  North 
and  South  determined  to  seize  this  Naboth's  vineyard. 
It  was  an  easy  problem  for  the  South,  which  possessed, 
on  the  frontier  of  Missouri,  a  population  so  ignorant 
and  so  fierce  as  to  be  veritable  outlaws,  and  all  of 
them  pro-slavery  in  their  sympathies.  It  was  a  light 
matter  to  move  them  into  Kansas  in  large  bodies,  and 
to  vote  that  territory  into  the  Union  under  a  consti 
tution  repeated  from  that  of  Missouri.  But  the  anti- 
slavery  sentiment  of  the  North  had  so  increased  that 
it  was  strong,  vigorous,  and  united,  and  had  be 
come  so  earnest  that  it  was  ready  to  make  sacrifices 
for  the  cause  it  had  at  heart.  Under  the  stimulus 
of  the  practical  shrewdness  of  New  England,  an  or 
ganization  was  formed,  called  the  "  Emigrant  Aid 
Society,"  for  the  express  purpose  of  sending  out  com 
panies  of  strong  men  to  settle  the  new  land.  Time  and 
money  were  given  lavishly,  and  colonies  were  gath 
ered  in  more  than  one  state.  It  may  well  be  believed 
that  these  were  no  carpet  knights,  but  they  were  full 
of  patriotic  fervour,  and  strong  in  the  belief  that  they 
worked  for  humanity.  They  early  learned  the  fallacy 
of  the  idea  that  theirs  was  to  be  a  peaceful  conquest. 
At  every  election  the  "Abolitionists"  encountered  the 
"  Border  Ruffians  "  in  fierce  and  often  bloody  con 
tests,  for  the  possession  of  the  polls  and  the  oppor 
tunity  to  vote.  Both  sides  poured  in  money  and  men. 
"  Bleeding  Kansas  "  was  the  watchword  of  the  North ; 
and  men  who  had  doubted  the  wisdom  of  the  and- 


KANSAS-NEBRASKA   STRUGGLE.  95 

slavery  proceedings  grew  fiercer  than  their  fellows  as 
they  watched  the  battle.  The  South  also  grew  more 
violent  with  every  week  of  the  struggle,  and  her  states 
men  counselled  the  bowie-knife  and  revolver,  and 
exemplified  their  counsel.  Each  party  made  a  con 
stitution,  and  tried  to  force  it  upon  the  people.  Gov 
ernor  after  governor  failed  to  quiet  the  territory; 
and  Congress  after  Congress  —  the  Thirty-third,  the 
Thirty-fourth,  the  Thirty- fifth  —  debated  under  every 
possible  shape  the  question  of  whether  it  should  admit 
pro-slavery  Kansas  under  the  Lecompton  constitu 
tion,  or  anti-slavery  Kansas  under  the  Topeka  (or 
Wyandot)  constitution.  These  things  were  a  part 
of  Sumner's  daily  life.  In  Congress  he  fought  the 
battles  of  Kansas,  and  out  of  it  he  found  other  service 
for  her  needs.  The  men  who  went  there  became  his 
friends,  and  his  correspondence  was  full  of  their  hopes 
or  the  story  of  their  wrongs  ;  at  home  or  in  the  Senate 
his  hours  of  leisure  and  his  hours  of  business  were  full 
of  Kansas,  and  the  panorama  of  her  troubled  life  was 
the  picture  always  before  his  eyes. 

The  anti-slavery  sentiment  of  the  country  grew 
beyond  measure  in  those  years.  The  situation  was 
better  understood :  the  aggressive  action  and  bitter 
spirit  of  the  South  disclosed  its  real  purpose;  the 
moral  question  at  last  made  itself  felt,  for  the  object- 
lessons  of  the  Fugitive  Slave  act,  and  the  warfare 
over  Kansas,  had  done  what  no  orator  could  do.  The 
question  of  slavery,  as  it  became  a  crucial  one,  split 
the  political  parties.  Southern  and  Northern  Whigs 
divided,  and  the  Democratic  party  could  by  no  means 
hold  to  its  pro-slavery  doctrine  its  full  Northern  sup- 


96  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

port ;  but  the  Free-Soil  party  was  not  strong  enough 
to  gain  the  waverers.  The  sudden  and  somewhat 
unaccountable  rise  of  the  American,  or  "  Know- 
Nothing"  party,  with  its  secret  lodges,  its  avowed 
hostility  to  foreign  immigration,  and  its  actual  enmity 
to  the  Roman  Catholic  church,  created  a  political 
diversion  that  had  important  consequences.  But 
great  as  was  the  temporary  success  of  that  organiza 
tion,  it  was  after  all  too  much  of  a  Cave  of  Adullam 
to  suit  the  leaders,  too  uncertain  a  leadership  to  suit 
the  people  of  the  North ;  so  by  the  sort  of  common 
purpose  and  simultaneous  action  characteristic  of  real 
uprisings,  a  new  party  sprang  up.  Here,  there,  every 
where,  we  hear  of  it.  It  was  born  in  Wisconsin,  in  the 
spring  of  1854  ;  it  was  christened  "  Republican"  at  a 
meeting  of  congressmen  to  discuss  the  situation  the 
morning  after  the  passage  of  the  Kansas- Nebraska 
bill,  urged  on  by  the  genius  and  influence  of  the  great 
anti-slavery  editor,  Gamaliel  Bailey  ;  or  it  sprang 
from  the  loins  of  Vermont  in  the  summer  of  that 
year;  or  Michigan  formed  and  christened  the  new 
party,  and  Ohio  established  it,  while  Massachusetts, 
not  yet  ready  to  join  its  ranks,  helped  on  the  work. 
The  "  Tribune,"  under  Greeley,  and  the  "  Indepen 
dent,"  and  the  "  Evening  Post,"  were  its  sponsors.  Yet 
the  Republican  hour  was  not  fully  ripe,  and  its  first 
successes  were  not  permanent.  The  Thirty-fourth 
Congress,  which  met  in  December,  1855,  still  had  a 
Democratic  Senate ;  but  the  House  registered  the  new 
purpose  of  the  people  in  an  "anti-Nebraska"  major 
ity,  which  eventually  elected  Nathaniel  P.  Banks 
Speaker,  though  only  after  a  long  struggle.  This 


PUBLIC  SPEECHES.  97 

first  considerable  victory  of  the  North  was  followed 
by  a  constant  support  of  anti-slavery  Kansas  by  the 
House,  against  the  constant  pro-slavery  decisions  of 
the  Senate  backed  by  the  administration  influence. 
These  were  the  legislative  experiences  of  Sumner's 
first  term  in  the  Senate,  but  the  political  situation 
concerned  him  also.  In  the  spring  of  1856  another 
presidential  contest  loomed  up,  to  intensify  the  heat 
and  bitterness  of  the  struggle.  The  Republicans, 
proud  to  be  known  by  their  chief  tenet  as  "Black 
Republicans,"  did  not  gather  as  much  strength  as 
they  hoped,  and  the  Democrats  still  .possessed  the 
field,  —  a  result  for  which  the  Know-Nothing  move 
ment  was  chiefly  responsible.  Sweeping  the  country 
in  1854,  this  movement  was  still  strong  in  1856,  espe 
cially  in  Massachusetts,  —  a  fact  which  had  an  im 
portant  bearing  on  Sumner's  future. 

As  the  years  went  by,  Sumner  took  a  larger  part  in 
the  discussions  and  deliberations  of  the  Senate ;  an  in 
significant  place  on  one  of  its  committees  was  reluc 
tantly  found  for  him,  and  he  made  good  use  of  it,  as 
of  all  other  occasions  to  let  his  voice  be  heard  for  free 
dom.  He  spoke  elsewhere  as  well.  The  last  Free-Soil 
convention  of  his  native  state,  and  its  first  Republi 
can  convention,  both  listened  to  his  arguments.  He 
made  every  occasion  an  opportunity.  Letters  on 
every  subject,  whether  it  was  the  example  of  James 
Otis,  the  duty  of  the  farmer,  the  character  of  Wash 
ington,  or  the  Fugitive  Slave  law,  alike  carried  some 
anti-slavery  admonition.  The  Boston  Mercantile  Li 
brary  Association  was  for  a  second  time  made  to  hear 
what  it  would  not,  as  he  expounded  the  lesson  of  a 
7 


98  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

merchant's  duties  as  illustrated  by  Granville  Sharp. 
Many  weeks  of  the  congressional  vacation  of  1856 
were  spent  in  delivering  a  lecture  called  the  "Anti- 
Slavery  Enterprise ;  its  Necessity,  Practicability,  and 
Dignity,"  in  Boston,  New  York,  Brooklyn,  and  else 
where,  always  to  crowded  and  enthusiastic  audiences. 
And  well  they  might  applaud  to  the  echo ;  for  this 
lecture  was  a  production  rarely  surpassed  for  its 
purpose,  an  epitome  of  fact  and  principle,  a  logical 
argument,  a  complete  statement  of  the  case,  in  such 
eloquent  phrase  and  oratorical  perfection  as  is  long 
since  a  lost  art.  In  those  days,  when  his  first  object 
was  to  convince,  and  his  soul  was  on  fire  with  earnest 
ness,  Sumner  sometimes  forgot  his  classics  and  his 
authorities,  and  appealed  to  the  hearts  of  men  in 
burning  words. 


SOCIAL  LIFE  IN  WASHINGTON.  99 


CHAPTER    X. 

SOCIAL  LIFE   IN   WASHINGTON. 

THE  sudden  transition  from  Mr.  Sumner's  personal 
life  to  his  public  career  is  not  entirely  arbitrary. 
Up  to  the  time  of  his  entrance  into  the  Senate  his 
life  was  strangely  confined  to  the  circle  of  his  own 
interests,  and  after  that  time  it  was  altogether  ab 
sorbed  in  the  sweep  of  public  events.  Nor  is  this 
a  figure  of  speech,  but  to  a  very  large  extent  literal 
truth.  A  curious  confirmation  of  it  is  the  difficulty 
of  finding  any  occasion  to  speak  of  this  personal  life 
that  does  not  seriously  interrupt  the  course  of  his 
career.  Boston  ostracism  made  a  sort  of  chasm  be 
tween  his  past  and  his  present.  General  society  was 
forbidden  ground  to  him,  and  perforce  he  was  shut 
up  to  a  small  circle.  Congressional  work  occupied 
the  larger  part  of  his  time,  and  the  anti-slavery  propa 
ganda  more  of  it,  while  both  kept  him  much  away 
from  Boston ;  but  the  course  he  had  taken  had  its 
direct  effect  upon  the  leisure  that  was  left  to  him, 
for  as  yet  the  Abolitionist  was  for  the  most  part 
despised  even  where  he  was  approved,  and  Sumner 
found  himself  thrown  into  their  ranks  for  his  associ 
ates,  —  an  association  which  his  personal  fastidious- 


loo  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

ness  caused  him  more  often  to  honour  in  the  breach 
than  in  the  observance.  Thus  in  Massachusetts, 
outside  the  small  circle  of  his  dearest  friends  and  his 
family,  he  was  much  shut  up  to  himself.  In  Washing 
ton  this  isolation  of  the  Abolitionist  was  absolute  and 
complete  outside  of  official  circles.  The  anti-slavery 
men  were  yet  too  few  for  the  group  of  kindred  spirits 
formed  a  little  later ;  and  in  the  last  years  of  President 
Fillmore  and  during  Pierce' s  term,  Washington  had 
no  anti-slavery  set  whatever.  Pierce's  administra 
tion  was  the  first  chapter  in  the  tale  of  social  South 
ern  rule  at  the  capital,  which  reached  its  height  in 
Buchanan's  time,  and  which  we  still  see  through  the 
glamour  of  tradition. 

The  Washington  to  which  Sumner  came  as  a  sena 
tor  in  1851  was  hardly  more  the  Washington  he  first 
saw  in  1834  than  it  was  the  brilliant  centre  of  to-day. 
In  outward  shape  it  had  changed  less  than  otherwise, 
but  it  was  still  straggling  and  unkempt.  Pennsyl 
vania  Avenue  stretched  its  length  from  the  Capitol  to 
Georgetown  unvexed  in  all  its  windy  spaces  by  any 
pavement ;  and  the  few  shops  that  served  the  needs 
of  the  provincial  town  were  most  of  them  below 
Seventh  Street,  —  below  Four  and  a  Half  Street,  in 
deed,  —  while  everywhere  private  houses  jostled  them 
and  each  other.  The  White  House  presented  the 
same  front  as  now ;  but  there  was  neither  Post  Office 
nor  Patent  Office,  and  the  curious  old  Treasury  and 
State  Departments  looked  across  vacant  ground  to 
where  Jefferson's  little  stable  occupied  what  is  now 
the  corner  of  G  Street  and  Fourteenth.  It  was  scarcely 
six  months  since  the  western  part  of  the  Capitol, 


SOCIAL  LIFE  IN  WASHINGTON.  IOI 

containing  the  Congressional  Library,  was  destroyed 
by  fire,  and  the  rest  of  it  preserved  only  by  the  exer 
tions  of  the  public,  including  the  President.  Still 
unfinished  and  uncrowned,  the  great  building  seemed 
to  mock  at  the  scarcely  begun  Monument,  and  neither 
guessed  what  pages  of  history  should  be  built  in  among 
its  stones.  Between  the  Capitol  and  Seventh  Street 
the  people  were  at  some  points  almost  crowded,  and 
the  fringe  of  houses  extending  along  the  rest  of  the 
avenue  grew  thicker  again  on  the  southwestern  side 
of  the  White  House,  where  their  windows  looked  over 
the  Potomac  to  the  beautiful  hills  of  Virginia.  Else 
where  were  great  barren  spaces,  swamps  and  creeks 
and  cypress-groves;  and  the  fine  estates  on  the 
Georgetown  Heights  seemed  to  say  that  no  such 
grandeur  would  ever  come  to  flat  and  dismal  Wash 
ington.  Indeed,  Alexandria  was  still  no  mean  rival 
of  its  sister  city  either  in  beauty  or  promise. 

But  if  Sumner  found  this  outward  face  of  things 
only  slightly  different  from  what  it  had  been  a  dozen 
years  before,  the  form  and  substance  of  society  had 
largely  altered.  The  days  of  the  friendly  boarding- 
houses  on  C  Street  were  waning,  and  a  more  festive 
life  had  begun,  though  it  was  not  yet  very  elaborate. 
The  day  of  Webster  and  Clay  and  Calhoun  and  the 
Seatons  was  departing.  The  happy  time  when  all 
Washington  met  at  the  old  market  in  the  early  morn 
ing,  and  Webster  bought  the  dinners  which  his  famous 
cook  served  to  brilliant  companies  at  two  or  three 
o'clock  in  the  afternoon ;  when  Tom  Benton's  almost 
too  fascinating  daughters  attracted  all  the  world  to 
his  hospitable  parlours  ;  when  Henry  Clay  dropped  in 


102  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

unannounced  and  charmed  young  women  with  his 
beautiful  voice  and  manner,  —  these  things  were  al 
most  gone ;  but  Edward  Everett  still  lived  in  his 
stately  mansion  overlooking  the  river,  and  General 
Cass  looked  across  from  his  dining-room  windows  to 
the  hospitable  heights  of  Arlington,  and  the  Carrolls 
vied  with  their  cousins  of  Capitol  Hill  in  elegant  en 
tertainment,  and  the  Ogle  Tayloes  filled  their  mansion 
on  Lafayette  Square  with  life  both  busy  and  gay,  while 
all  the  magnates  of  Georgetown  kept  open  house  in 
the  free  Southern  fashion  of  their  birth  and  training. 
General  Marcy  and  his  associates  in  the  Cabinet,  and 
Speaker  Cobb,  and  many  others  in  official  station 
gave  brilliant  dinners  at  which  they  served  the  old 
madeira  we  still  hear  of,  and  invited  the  general 
public  to  large  receptions ;  Jenny  Lind  and  Lola  Mon- 
tez  and  Charlotte  Cushman,  Burton  and  Brougham 
and  Forrest  and  the  elder  Booth  amused  the  gay 
world.  But  through  it  all  a  more  formal  tone  ap 
peared  than  of  old,  and  more  of  elaboration.  The 
manners  of  the  time  were  extremely  formal  in  their 
expression,  and  extremely  fiery  under  the  outer  crust. 
A  quick  word  was  sure  to  bring  fighting ;  and  a  duel 
was  none  the  less  fatal  because  it  was  conducted  with 
the  greatest  dignity.  Indeed,  there  were  recognized 
duelling-grounds  at  Bladensburg,  a  few  miles  north 
of  the  Capitol,  where  gentlemen  were  wont  to  seek 
satisfaction  from  their  equals ;  and  it  was  at  this 
period  that  we  hear  of  a  congressman  shooting  dead 
the  waiter  at  the  National  Hotel  who  failed  to  bring 
his  dinner  promptly  enough.  Of  such  sort  was  the 
society  of  Washington  at  this  time;  but  among  it 


SOCIAL   LIFE  IN  WASHINGTON.  103 

though  he  was,  Sumner  was  in  no  sense  of  it.  Yan 
kees  and  Abolitionists  were  in  no  favour  with  Franklin 
Pierce  or  Jefferson  Davis  or  Chief- Justice  Taney,  round 
Washington  dinner-tables  or  in  Georgetown  drawing- 
rooms.  At  a  White  House  reception  the  President 
himself  greeted  the  wife  of  John  P.  Hale,  but  turned 
his  back  on  the  Senator;  and  we  hear  of  Sumner 
or  Chase  at  official  entertainments,  or  at  those  few 
houses  where  Northern  sentiments  were  not  yet  ta 
booed,  or  were  possibly  approved  ;  but  in  general  Sum- 
ner's  Washington  life  was  spent  as  he  had  been  wont 
to  spend  his  student  days,  —  in  work  and  books. 

Yet  if  he  was  not  a  part  of  that  gay  life  which  had 
so  fascinated  him  in  England  and  afterward  in  Boston, 
he  was  by  no  means  without  friends  or  that  social  life 
which  is  after  all  the  cream  of  society,  —  the  friendly 
intercourse  of  one  or  two  congenial  spirits  (and  the 
very  phrase  "  congenial  "  to  Charles  Sumner  obviously 
implies  cultivation  of  a  rare  sort) .  There  were  even 
then  homes  in  Washington  where  Sumner  was  more 
than  welcome,  and  men  who  exchanged  thought  with 
him  on  literature  and  life,  the  principles  and  the  phi 
losophies  of  things.  It  was  at  this  time  that  he  sought 
the  acquaintance  of  a  brilliant  young  review-writer 
in  a  leading  Washington  journal,  and  thus  began  the 
friendship  with  Dr.  J.  C.  Welling,  now  President  of 
Columbian  University,  which  held  firm  until  the  hour 
of  his  death,  and  often  furnished  him  that  intellectual 
stimulus  he  craved,  unaffected  by  political  difference 
or  public  action.  A  few  extracts  from  his  early  cor 
respondence  with  Dr.  Welling  will  show  after  what 
fashion  this  "  scullion  "  occupied  himself  "  while  the 


104  CHARLES  SUMMER. 

\ 

Senate  prosed,"  as  he  put  it.  These  extracts  have  a 
special  interest  as  indicating  something  both  directly 
and  indirectly  of  his  views  of  life  at  that  time.  A 
review  of  Comte  had  attracted  Sumner's  attention,  and 
he  writes  thus  regarding  it  to  its  unknown  author : 

"  The  French  philosopher  is  a  remarkable  intellect, 
who  ought  to  be  known,  though  with  you  I  turn  sorrow 
fully  from  much  that  he  has  said.  There  is  a  Scottish 
writer,  Patrick  Edward  Dove,  —  yet  a  young  man,  —  who 
has  treated  the  same  theme  with  more  clearness  and  sim 
plicity  than  Comte,  and  without  his  repulsive  features. 
His  work,  'The  Theory  of  Human  Progression,'  shows 
the  march  and  sequence  of  the  science  with  the  certain 
future  in  a  more  satisfactory  way  than  Comte,  while  it 
recognizes  throughout  those  divine  things  which  Comte 
repudiates." 

On  coming  to  know  Mr.  Welling,  Sumner  continues 
the  subject  on  the  broader  philosophical  lines,  in  this 
fashion :  — 

"As  a  humble  student,  in  moments  taken  from  other 
things,  of  departments  illustrated  by  your  elegant  pen,  I 
have  been  glad  to  renew  early  impressions,  and  to  live 
again  the  true  life. 

"  Allow  me  to  suggest  the  inquiry,  since  you  refer  to 
Vico,  whether  his  work  at  this  time  can  be  regarded  as 
an  important  guide  ?  He  taught  the  Unity  of  Humanity, 
and  illustrated  it  from  history  and  literature;  but  he  was 
rilled  with  the  ideas  of  the  vicious  circle  in  which  society 
was  supposed  to  have  revolved,  —  proceeding  to  a  certain 
stage  and  then  pulling  back,  —  and  did  not  see  its  sure 
and  irresistible  march. 

"  Bacon,  perhaps,  in  saying  that  Moderns  stood  on  the 
shoulders  of  the  Ancients,  suggests  the  whole  thought. 


SOCIAL  LIFE  IN   WASHINGTON.  105 

But  there  are  several  writers  of  France  who  seem  to  me 
to  have  struck  the  subject  to  the  quick  more  even  than 
Vico,  though  down  to  the  time  of  Condorcet  no  one  had 
considered  it  at  length.  I  might  begin  with  Descartes, 
though  I  forget  now  the  title  of  the  work.  There  is  also 
a  chapter  of  Pascal  in  his  '  Pense'es,'  suppressed  in  the 
early  edition  for  a  century,  which  is  very  pregnant.  It 
is  somewhere  toward  the  beginning. 

"  The  discussion  in  France  at  the  close  of  the  seven 
teenth  century  on  the  comparative  worth  of  the  Ancients 
and  Moderns,  struck  at  some  things  bearing  upon  this 
subject,  in  the  writings  of  Perrault,  and  also  of  Fonte- 
nelle.  But  I  speak  of  things  familiar  to  you  ;  though 
while  the  Senate  proses,  there  is  a  pleasure  in  drawing 
about  me  these  pleasant  memories.  .  .  .  But  the  work  of 
Dove  to  which  I  first  called  your  attention  seems  to  me 
to  have  a  strong  grasp,  and  to  open  more  clearly  than  any 
other  book  the  future  of  science  and  life." 

In  another  passage  we  see  that  for  him  the  prime 
attraction  of  political  life  was  not  so  much  in  the 
special  cause  he  was  then  championing,  as  in  its 
possibilities  :  — 

"  I  am  happy  that  my  judgment  of  the  work  of  Mr. 
Dove  is  confirmed  by  an  authority  like  yourself.  His 
book,  more  than  anything  else  in  my  studies  or  specula 
tions,  has  made  me  hope  for  a  science  of  politics,  exact 
and  reliable.  In  my  own  mind  I  had  foreseen  this  dis 
tant  millennial  result;  his  book  has  made  it  palpable. 
Still,  I  may  err,  and  I  know  full  well  that  this  grand 
consummation  can  be  reached  only  through  cycles  of  his 
tory;  but  that  it  will  be  reached,  I  have  now  a  full  assur 
ance,  and  to  live  for  that  future,  —  to  strive  for  it  with  the 
eye  ever  fixed  upon  it,  —  seems  to  me  the  only  thing  which 
can  worthily  tempt  a  person  into  public  life.  I  admit  all 


106  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

the  difficulties  in  the  way.  It  is  these  which  prevent  the 
great  discovery  at  this  moment.  .  .  .  You  are  right  in 
your  appreciation  of  the  difficulties  in  systematizing  the 
phenomena  relating  to  man.  But  they  are  not  greater 
now  than  were  the  difficulties  only  a  century  ago  with  re 
gard  to  Chemistry,  which  has  at  last  crystallized  into  a 
perfect  science.  Not  to  the  necessity  of  things,  but  to 
the  unfinished  state  of  our  researches,  do  I  ascribe  our 
present  ignorance.  Le  jour  viendra.  It  is  true  that 
much  depends  on  the  honesty,  as  well  as  skill,  of  man  ; 
but  I  take  it  that  he  will  rise  hereafter,  not  only  in  intel 
ligence,  but  in  virtue.  If  he  does  not,  then  farewell  any 
millennium  on  earth  !  ...  It  has  always  been  a  surprise 
to  me  that  a  writer  like  Michelet  could  have  dwelt  on 
Vico  with  so  much  rapture ;  but  this  introduction  to  his 
translation  has  a  kindred  vagueness." 

The  vacations  of  senatorial  life  were  sometimes 
seasons  of  rest  and  refreshment,  and  often  only  change 
of  work.  The  Free-Soil  and  Know-Nothing  cam 
paigns  took  much  of  Stunner's  time  and  strength, 
and  still  more  of  vital  force  went  into  the  anti- slavery 
lectures  already  spoken  of.  When  he  left  Boston  for 
Washington,  the  Longfellow  household  found  "  Sun 
day  without  Sumner  a  melancholy  and  unusual  thing." 
For  a  long  time  it  was  his  habit  to  dine  there,  and 
afterward  to  take  a  Sunday  tea  with  Richard  H.  Dana. 
This  last  friendship  suffered  a  temporary  eclipse  in 
the  course  of  time.  "  Dana,"  says  his  biographer, 
"  as  was  apt  to  be  the  case  sooner  or  later  with  Sum- 
ner's  friends,  incurred  his  displeasure  by  differing 
from  him  in  public  over  some  question  of  public 
policy,  and  for  years  visits  ceased."  But  in  the  end 
the  friendship  was  renewed  to  some  extent.  On  the 


SOCIAL   LIFE   IN   WASHINGTON.  107 

Senator's  return  in  the  summers  he  made  up  for  his 
absence  by  still  more  frequent  dinners  or  long  nights 
over  the  library  fire  at  Craigie  House,  and  by  regular 
visits  to  Longfellow  at  Nahant,  where  books  new  and 
old,  past  experiences  and  present  companions,  and 
much  talk  of  men  and  things  whiled  away  the  moon 
light  that  shone  over  sea  and  shore.  If  Emerson 
gave  a  dinner  to  the  young  Englishman  Arthur 
Clough,  or  if  any  other  political  or  literary  lion  was 
to  be  honoured,  Sumner's  presence  was  necessary  to 
the  complete  success  of  the  undertaking,  —  always 
provided  that  it  was  not  fashionable  or  political  Bos 
ton  that  would  do  honour  to  its  guests.  That  half  the 
world,  whether  ancien  regime  or  parvenu,  had  no 
knowledge  of  the  Abolitionist  Senator.  In  his  family, 
time  had  begun  to  work  the  changes  already  alluded 
to.  Two  of  his  brothers  died  during  these  years ;  and 
in  1852  George  Sumner  returned  for  the  first  time 
from  his  fifteen  years  of  travel  and  study  in  Europe, 
and  made  a  place  for  himself  in  the  charming  circles 
which  his  brother  could  then  open  to  him.  Partly 
because  of  his  well-known  fitness  for  the  place,  and 
partly  because  he  represented  the  element  with  which 
General  Marcy  was  himself  in  sympathy,  that  gentle 
man  induced  President  Pierce  to  offer  him  the  place 
of  Assistant  Secretary  of  State  under  Marcy;  but 
this  offer  was  promptly  declined. 


io8  CHARLES  SUM  NEK. 


CHAPTER   XI. 

/' 

1856. 

SUMMER'S   SPEECH,  "THE   CRIME   AGAINST  KANSAS."  — 
ASSAULT. ILLNESS.  —  RECEPTION  AT  BOSTON. 

IT  is  said  that  few  great  events  come  to  us  bearing 
their  insignia,  but  in  simple,  commonplace  guise  meet 
us  in  the  way,  and  testing  men  and  the  time  alike, 
they  show  us  hero  or  coward,  or  on  a  sudden  change 
the  date  of  the  world's  reckoning  and  fix  a  new  epoch. 
In  this  manner  Sumner  himself  and  the  anti-slavery 
cause  suddenly  came  upon  a  day  of  great  happening. 
Midway  in  the  debate  on  the  long  and  constantly 
changing  conflict  over  Kansas,  Sumner  delivered  one 
of  his  great  speeches,  which  proved  to  be  his  best- 
known  effort,  for  reasons  he  little  anticipated.  At  this 
particular  point  the  debate  ran  on  a  motion  of  Sena 
tor  Douglas  to  admit  Kansas  to  the  Union  with  a 
slave  constitution,  and  a  counter  motion  of  Senator 
Seward.  On  the  i9th  of  May,  1856,  Sumner  rose  to 
speak.  He  spoke  for  two  days,  and  all  that  was  true 
of  his  former  speeches  on  slavery  was  more  than  true 
of  this  one.  Its  very  title  was  a  dagger- thrust ;  "  The 
Crime  against  Kansas "  was  a  whole  argument  in 
itself.  He  spoke  to  a  full  assemblage  of  his  associ 
ates,  to  galleries  crowded  with  well-known  men  and 


"  THE   CRIME  AGAINST  KANSAS."        109 

women,  and  to  a  listening  and  excited  country.  Ma- 
caulay's  brilliant  phrases  were  a  model  for  those  who 
described  the  scene,  as  doubtless  Burke's  great 
speech  was  in  a  measure  Sumner's  own  model.  There 
was  in  fact  little  parallel  between  the  two  occasions, 
but  the  common  use  of  the  illustration  in  the  con 
temporary  press  serves  to  show  the  distinguished 
character  of  the  audience  and  the  nature  and  power 
of  the  speech.  Newspaper  reports  are  not  always 
exact  criticism,  but  those  which  the  Senator  himself 
embalmed  in  his  works  may  be  taken  as  in  some 
sense  authoritative.  Among  other  papers,  the  "  Trib 
une  "  called  it  the  most  masterly,  striking,  and  scath 
ing  production  of  the  session.  "  His  excoriation  of 
Douglas  was  scornfully  withering  and  scorching."  A 
prominent  St.  Louis  paper  declared,  "  In  vigour  and 
richness  of  diction,  in  felicity  and  fecundity  of  illus 
tration,  in  breadth  and  completeness  of  view,  he  stands 
unsurpassed.  He  laid  the  classics,  the  Gothic  my 
thology,  the  imaginative  literature  of  Europe,  and  the 
Bible  under  contribution  for  imagery  and  quotation ; 
that  he  had  the  great  speech  of  Cicero  and  the 
greater  speech  of  Burke  in  his  mind's  eye  there  can 
be  no  doubt."  And  this  journal  commends  still  more 
warmly  his  castigation  of  Douglas  and  Mason.  The 
"Evening  Post  "called  the  speech  "  a  feast  of  elo 
quence,"  and  quoted  the  words  of  a  veteran  senator 
that  it  was  "  the  most  signal  combination  of  oratorical 
splendour  that  has  ever  been  witnessed  in  that  hall," 
with  its  further  analysis  as  a  "  union  of  clear  state 
ment,  close  and  well-put  reasoning,  piquant  person 
ality  and  satire  freighted  with  a  wealth  of  learning  and 


no  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

apposite  illustrations,  every  one  of  which  was  subsidiary 
to  the  main  argument."  The  same  paper  goes  on  to 
describe  the  audience  as  unequalled  since  the  days  of 
Webster.  Webster,  Burke,  Cicero,  and  Demosthenes 
were  the  favourite  comparisons  in  these  extravagant 
estimates,  which  are  valuable  now  only  as  they  bring 
back  to  us  in  some  slight  degree  the  nature  and  effect 
of  the  speech. 

It  is  obvious  that  an  oration  so  loaded  with  learn 
ing,  so  logical  as  an  argument,  so  adorned  with  illus 
tration,  will  not  bear  much  quotation.  It  must  be  read 
as  a  whole ;  nor  indeed  would  quotation  really  illus 
trate  it,  for  Sumner's  work  needs  the  personality  behind 
it.  Like  an  antique  vase,  its  beauty  is  gone  when  it  is 
empty  of  life.  But  no  one  can  read  the  comments 
already  quoted  without  discovering  another  thing ;  it 
was,  as  Whittier  says  in  a  letter  of  congratulation,  "  a 
severe  and  terrible  philippic,"  and  the  enemy  writhed 
under  it.  The  manner  in  which  Southern  chivalry 
chose  to  debate  the  great  governmental  questions,  by 
the  direct  personal  attack,  had  not  been  without  its 
effect ;  and  under  the  three  heads,  "  the  crime  against 
Kansas  in  its  origin  and  extent,  the  apologies  for  the 
crime,  and  the  true  remedy,"  Sumner  did  not  hesi 
tate  to  speak  plainly  and  directly,  and  with  a  force 
that  did  not  mince  words  or  phrases.  If  eloquence 
may  exalt  a  hero  to  the  skies,  no  less  it  may  consign 
an  enemy  to  the  lowest  depths.  Under  its  first  head 
the  speech  was  a  complete  history  of  the  struggle  up 
to  that  time.  The  apologies  for  the  crime  he  divided 
into  four  classes,  which  he  characterized  as  the  apology 
tyrannical,  the  apology  imbecile,  the  apology  absurd, 


"THE    CRIME  AGAINST  KANSAS."          in 

and  the  apology  infamous,  in  a  passage  which  his 
enemies  did  him  the  honour  to  call  an  exact  imita 
tion  of  Demosthenes.  He  did  not  hesitate  to  arraign 
men  as  well  as  measures,  bringing  President  Pierce 
himself  to  the  bar.  In  like  manner  and  after  a  like 
fashion  he  styled  the  proposed  remedies  the  remedy 
of  tyranny,  the  remedy  of  folly,  the  remedy  of  in 
justice  and  civil  war,  and  the  remedy  of  justice  and 
peace,  —  four  caskets,  he  said,  to  be  opened  by  sena 
torial  vote.  As  in  his  first  speech  on  slavery,  the 
Constitution  was  expounded  with  his  rare  knowledge 
of  law,  and  history  was  made  to  testify  in  his  cause. 

The  debate  which  immediately  followed  the  speech 
was  of  an  entirely  different  character,  and  of  small 
value ;  but  in  the  sum  of  causes  which  produced  the 
immediate  events,  it  bore  a  considerable  importance. 
The  heat  which  the  speech  aroused  may  be  imagined 
by  this  debate.  Cass  described  the  speech  as  the 
"  most  un-American  and  unpatriotic  that  ever  grated 
on  the  ears  of  the  Senate."  Mason,  in  language  care 
fully  kept  within  parliamentary  bounds,  called  Sumner 
a  liar  and  branded  him  as  a  new  Cain.  Douglas  com 
pared  the  speech,  with  detailed  description,  to  a 
pieced-up  calico  bedquilt,  and  declared  that  its 
classic  allusions  were  distinguished  for  "  lascivious- 
ness  and  obscenity,"  were  drawn  from  those  portions 
of  the  classics  usually  suppressed  as  unfit  for  decent 
reading,  and  suggested  that  Sumner's  object  was  to 
provoke  his  adversaries  to  kick  him  like  a  dog,  that 
he  might  gain  sympathy ;  charging  him  in  the  same 
breath  with  practising  the  speech  before  a  mirror 
with  a  little  negro  to  hold  the  candle,  and  with 


112  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

repudiating  the  Constitution  and  his  oath.  But  if 
this  was  one  half  the  story,  it  must  be  confessed 
the  other  was  not  unlike  it ;  for  Sumner  retorted  by 
begging  permission  of  Cass  to  describe  him  as  dis 
loyal  to  the  fathers  and  the  Constitution,  and  dismiss 
ing  Mason  as  one  below  argument,  who  displayed 
"  plantation  manners."  Douglas  he  called  a  common 
scold,  and  accused  -him  in  stinging  words  of  a  bowie- 
knife  and  bludgeon  style  of  debate,  of  the  swagger 
of  Bob  Acres  and  the  ferocity  of  the  Malay,  and 
finished  by  comparing  him  in  set  terms  to  "  a 
noisome,  squat,  and  nameless  animal,"  who,  in  "vio 
lation  of  all  decency,  switches  out  from  his  tongue 
the  perpetual  stench  of  offensive  personality;"  and 
as  if  this  was  not  enough,  he  repeated  the  passage 
still  more  directly,  "The  Senator  has  switched  his 
tongue,  and  again  he  fills  the  Senate  with  his  offen 
sive  odour." 

Standing  by  themselves,  these  vituperations  leave 
little  choice  between  their  authors,  and  they  are 
given  here  for  two  reasons,  —  to  show  the  extent  to 
which  cultivated  and  dignified  men  were  driven  by 
the  violence  of  their  passions  at  this  time  of  hot 
rage,  and  to  show  how  strong  and  unbearable  was 
Sumner's  language.  Taken  out  of  its  context  and 
without  the  splendid  background  of  the  speech,  it 
does  Sumner  great  injustice  by  assuming  an  undue 
proportion ;  but  this  passage  at  arms  cannot  be 
omitted,  because  these  remarks  and  others  of  a  like 
nature  aimed  at  another  senator  were  the  ostensible 
reasons  for  an  attack  really  directed  at  his  unan 
swerable  arguments  against  slavery. 


ASSAULT.  113 

A  considerable  part  of  the  speech  itself  was  de 
voted  to  Senator  Butler,  of  South  Carolina.  Not 
only  were  the  arguments  of  that  gentleman  merci 
lessly  laid  low,  but  their  author  was  branded  as  the 
Don  Quixote  of  the  Southern  cause,  and  elaborately 
and  scornfully  described  with  other  more  offensive 
figures  and  illustrations.  It  is  true  that  Sumner 
never  realized  the  force  of  these  or  any  such  words 
he  so  frequently  uttered  in  debate.  In  after  years 
he  used  to  ask  his  secretary  with  perfect  simplicity 
what  it  was  in  the  speech  on  Kansas  that  Butler's 
friends  objected  to,  what  part  of  it  they  considered 
insulting ;  but  his  words  were  all  the  more  unbearable 
for  this  supreme  self-assertion  in  them.  The  Southern 
code  knew  but  one  way  to  meet  such  treatment  •  but 
the  duel  was  for  gentlemen.  In  this  perplexity,  Pres 
ton  Brooks,  a  nephew  of  Senator  Butler,  and  himself  a 
Representative  from  South  Carolina,  Keitt  of  Charles 
ton,  and  others  consulted  how  they  could  best  revenge 
the  insult,  and  yet  publicly  mark  their  contempt  for 
the  man.  It  was  determined  to  cane  him,  but  they 
were  somewhat  concerned  how  to  make  the  punish 
ment  most  disgraceful.  Other  elements  of  perplexity 
entered  in,  moreover.  It  is  said  that  at  first  they 
thought  of  beating  him  on  Pennsylvania  Avenue  as  he 
walked  up  to  the  Capitol,  but  finally  concluded  that 
plan  impossible,  as  he  was  the  biggest  and  might  beat 
them.  They  then  discussed  the  question  of  attacking 
him  on  the  Capitol  steps  ;  but  the  matter  of  size  was 
again  an  obstacle  to  the  fury  of  these  brave  champions 
of  insulted  national  honour  and  family  pride.  At  last 
they  definitely  determined  to  take  some  safe  opportu- 


H4  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

nity  when  he  was  off  guard  and  in  a  defenceless 
position,  and  so  at  the  mercy  of  an  adversary.  The 
day  following  the  close  of  the  debate  the  Senate  ad 
journed  at  an  early  hour,  and  Sumner  remained  at  his 
desk  writing.  Preston  Brooks  came  up  from  behind, 
well  protected  by  friends  at  hand,  and  struck  the 
Senator  on  the  head,  blow  after  blow,  with  a  gutta- 
percha  cane.  Thanks  to  the  desk  which  pinioned 
Sumner's  legs,  though  he  tore  it  from  its  iron  fasten 
ings  in  the  effort  to  free  himself,  Brooks  was  safe, 
and  went  out,  leaving  his  victim  lying  on  the  floor 
senseless  and  covered  with  blood. 

It  was  true  that  accounts  of  mobs  had  long  been 
daily  reading,  and  Kansas  had  newly  taught  the  use 
of  fire  and  the  shot-gun.  It  was  true  that  men  daily 
clicked  their  pistols  to  emphasize  their  fierce  debate 
in  the  House  of  Representatives,  and  it  was  not  un 
common  to  shoot  one  another  for  polities'  sake  in  that 
time ;  but  the  North  after  all  was  only  beginning  to 
realize  these  things.  The  circumstances  of  this  beating 
brought  it  home  to  every  slavery- hating  fireside.  In 
concrete  and  visible  form,  the  South  had  shown  its 
feeling ;  and  that  there  might  be  no  mistake  about  it, 
the  whole  South  now  took  up  the  cause  of  Mr.  Brooks. 
Congratulations  and  addresses  poured  in  upon  him. 
Cane  after  cane  came  duly  inscribed.  He  was  the 
hero  of  banquets  and  drawing-rooms.  Addresses  were 
presented  to  him  at  public  meetings.  Southern  states 
men  and  Northern  politicians,  Jefferson  Davis  and 
James  Buchanan,  made  equal  haste  to  approve  his 
deed.  The  press  expressed  the  universal  sentiment. 
It  is  worth  while  to  quote  from  one  of  the  leading 


ASSAULT.  115 

papers  at  length,  even  at  the  risk  of  Deing  somewhat 
tedious,  since  it  is  now  so  difficult  to  realize  the  pecu 
liar  temper  which  produced  and  applauded  such  deeds. 
Said  the  "  Richmond  Enquirer  "  :  — 

"We  consider  the  act  good  in  conception,  better  in 
execution,  and  best  of  all  in  consequence.  The  vulgar 
Abolitionists  in  the  Senate  are  getting  above  themselves. 
They  have  been  humoured  until  they  forget  their  posi 
tion.  They  have  grown  saucy,  and  dare  to  be  impudent 
to  gentlemen.  Now,  they  are  a  low,  mean,  scurvy  set, 
with  some  little  book-learning,  but  as  utterly  devoid  of 
spirit  and  honour  as  a  pack  of  curs.  .  .  .  They  must  be 
lashed  into  submission.  Sumner  in  particular  ought  to 
have  nine  and  thirty  early  every  morning.  He  is  a  great, 
strapping  fellow,  and  could  stand  the  cowhide  beauti 
fully.  Brooks  frightened  him,  and  at  the  first  blow  of 
the  cane  he  bellowed  like  a  bull-calf." 

After  a  long  passage  paying  like  delicate  attention 
to  other  Republicans,  the  editor  goes  on  to  say :  — 

"  Southern  gentlemen  must  protect  their  own  honour 
and  feelings.  //  is  an  idle  mockery  to  challenge  one  of 
these  scullions ;  if  is  eq^^ally  useless  to  attempt  to  dis 
grace  them.  They  are  insensible  to  shame,  and  can  be 
brought  to  reason  only  by  an  application  of  cowhide  or 
gutta-percha.  Let  them  once  understand  that  for  every 
vile  word  spoken  against  the  South  they  will  suffer  so 
many  stripes,  and  they  will  soon  learn  to  behave  them 
selves  like  decent  dogs,  —  they  can  never  be  gentlemen. 
Mr.  Brooks  has  initiated  this  salutary  discipline,  and  he 
deserves  applause  for  the  bold,  judicious  manner  in 
which  he  chastised  the  scamp  Sumner.  It  was  a  proper 
act,  done  at  the  proper  time  and  in  the  proper  place.  .  .  . 
It  was  literally  and  entirely  proper  that  he  should  be 
stricken  down  and  beaten  just  beside  the  desk  against 


n6  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

which  he  leaned  as  he  fulminated  his  filthy  utterances 
through  the  Capitol.  It  is  idle  to  talk  of  the  sanctity  of 
the  Senate-chamber,  since  it  is  polluted  by  the  presence 
of  such  fellows  as  Wilson,  Sumner,  and  Wade.  .  .  . 
We  trust  other  gentlemen  will  follow  the  example  of 
Mr.  Brooks,  that  so  a  curb  may  be  imposed  upon  the 
truculence  and  audacity  of  Abolition  speakers.  If  need 
be,  let  us  have  a  caning  or  cowhiding  every  day.  If 
the  worst  come  to  the  worst,  so  much  the  sooner,  so 
much  the  better." 

The  Senate  appointed  a  committee  to  consider  the 
matter,  which  retreated  behind  a  convenient  techni 
cality,  and  contented  itself  with  finally  transmitting 
the  facts  to  the  House  of  Representatives.  In  that 
body,  however,  there  was  excitement  enough.  A 
fierce  debate  preceded  the  appointment  of  a  com 
mittee  ;  a  still  fiercer  debate  followed  its  report  that 
Brooks  be  expelled.  The  resolution  of  expulsion  was 
lost  for  lack  of  a  two-thirds  vote  ;  and  Brooks  followed 
a  vote  of  censure  by  a  speech  in  which  he  avowed 
satisfaction  with  his  deliberately  planned  act,  and 
claimed  praise  that  he  did  not  make  it  the  begin 
ning  of  a  revolution,  closing  with  a  grandiloquent 
announcement  of  his  resignation.  His  constituents 
took  only  time  enough  for  some  of  the  receptions 
and  banquets  with  which  they  delighted  to  honour 
him,  before  sending  him  back  again  fitly  to  repre 
sent  them  in  the  House.  Meanwhile  a  prosecution 
in  the  courts  of  Washington  resulted  in  a  merely 
nominal  fine  of  three  hundred  dollars. 

But  the  North  was  equally  aroused.  Wilson,  in  a 
fiery  speech  on  the  floor  of  the  Senate,  declared  the 
assault  to  have  been  "  brutal,  murderous,  and  cow- 


ASSAULT.  117 

ardly,"  —  for  which  a  conclave  of  Southern  gentle 
men  proposed  like  treatment  for  him  also,  and  were 
only  dissuaded  by  the  personal  influence  of  Speaker 
Orr.  But  a  challenge  did  follow,  which  he  coura 
geously  declined.  In  the  House  of  Representatives 
one  of  Sumner's  colleagues  and  defenders,  Anson 
Burlingame,  of  Massachusetts,  was  met  by  Brooks 
himself  with  another  challenge;  and  a  duel  was 
arranged,  but  in  the  end  declined  by  Brooks,  who,  as 
he  was.  previously  afraid  to  meet  a  bigger  man  in 
open  fight,  at  this  time  declared  himself  afraid  to 
pass  through  the  North  to  the  appointed  duelling- 
grounds  at  Niagara.  If  there  were  public  meetings 
at  the  South,  there  were  like  assemblies  at  the  North, 
where  the  aged  and  conservative  Josiah  Quincy  de 
fended  the  statesman  who  had  been  his  student, 
and  joined  the  fiery  Phillips  in  the  fiercest  condem 
nation  of  Brooks's  attack,  while  they  prophesied  for 
the  scarred  brow  laurels  that  would  never  fade.  The 
Legislature  of  Massachusetts  resolved  that  the  assault 
was  "  brutal  and  cowardly  in  itself,  a  gross  breach  of 
parliamentary  privilege,  a  ruthless  attack  upon  the 
liberty  of  speech,  an  outrage  of  the  decencies  of 
civilized  life,  and  an  indignity  to  the  commonwealth 
of  Massachusetts."  The  force  of  the  occurrence  and 
its  real  meaning  is  well  expressed  by  Wilson  :  "  Stand 
ing  alone,"  he  says,  "  it  was  but  one  of  many  outrages 
which  have  disfigured  and  disgraced  human  history ; 
but  standing  as  it  does  in  its  relation  to  the  irrepres 
sible  conflict  between  freedom  and  slavery,  it  was  a 
revelation  of  a  state  of  public  feeling  and  sentiment, 
especially  at  the  South,  which  both  startled  and  sur- 


Il8  CHARLES  SUMArER. 

prised  the  nation  and  the  world.  Thus  considered, 
it  shows  Mr.  Brooks  as  only  a  fit  representative  of 
the  dominating  influence  of  the  slaveholding  states." 
Wilson  became  himself  a  like  representative  of  the 
effect  on  the  North  when  he  said :  "  When  I  lifted 
his  bleeding  body  from  the  floor  and  laid  him  upon  a 
lounge,  and  then  washed  his  blood  from  my  hands,  I 
swore  eternal  vengeance  to  slavery,  and  consecrated 
my  life  anew  to  the  cause  of  human  freedom."  And 
in  like  tone  Longfellow  writes :  "  I  have  just  been 
reading  again  your  speech ;  it  is  the  greatest  voice, 
on  the  greatest  subject,  that  has  been  uttered  since 
we  became  a  nation.  No  matter  for  insults,  —  we 
feel  them  with  you ;  no  matter  for  wounds,  —  we  also 
bleed  in  them  !  You  have  torn  the  mask  off  the 
faces  of  traitors,  and  at  last  the  spirit  of  the  North  is 
aroused."  And  some  weeks  later  :  "  One  good  result 
of  all  this  is  that  at  length  freedom  and  slavery  stand 
face  to  face  in  the  field  as  never  before." 

Thus,  as  so  often  happens,  a  picturesque  and  per 
sonal  wrong  apparently  counted  for  more  in  the  public 
mind  than  years  of  oppression  and  months  of  crime. 
Rather  and  more  truly  let  us  say,  it  crystallized  the 
feeling  already  excited  and  needing  a  centre.  The 
North  came  to  look  upon  Charles  Sumner  as  hero  and 
martyr ;  and  round  him  gathered  not  only  sympathy, 
but  sentiment,  —  that  strongest  of  all  public  motives. 
In  a  very  real  sense  he  seemed  to  represent  the  North 
to  itself. 

Sumner  spent  the  summer  months  in  a  vain  search 
for  recovery.  The  first  weeks,  at  Frank  Blair's  beau 
tiful  country-seat  of  Silver  Spring,  did  not  work  that 


RECEPTION  AT  BOSTON,  HQ 

happy  relief  which  was  hoped,  and  were  followed  by 
many  months  of  enforced  idleness  under  the  care  of 
those  dear  friends  who  made  home  for  him  wherever 
he  found  them,  —  the  brothers  Furness  of  Philadel- 
phia,  —  in  trying  the  breath  of  the  sea  at  Cape  May, 
or  breathing  the  air  of  the  mountains  at  Cresson. 
He  writes  from  the  latter  place  in  September,  "  The 
hardest  circumstance  in  my  lot  has  been  the  enforced 
absence  from  my  post  for  the  first  time  in  my  life ;  " 
and  a  week  later,  disappointed  at  a  fresh  decree  of 
the  doctor,  "  He  insists  that  I  must  keep  from  all 
chance  of  excitement  before  cold  weather,  if  I  wish 
to  take  my  seat  at  the  next  session.  At  times  I 
think  him  wrong,  and  then  again  I  feel  that  he  is 
right.  Since  I  have  been  here,  I  have  been  dis 
heartened  with  regard  to  myself.  For  the  present  I 
am  hors  du  combat" 

It  was  October  before  he  reached  Boston,  and  his 
own  house,  and  the  triumphal  reception  with  which 
Massachusetts  was  eager  to  honour  him.  He  had 
declined  to  receive  the  payment  of  the  expenses  of 
his  illness  which  the  Governor  in  a  special  message 
to  the  Legislature  proposed  that  it  should  pay,  and 
he  also  refused  a  magnificent  silver  vase  which 
his  friends  wished  to  present  him,  —  begging  them 
to  give  the  money  already  subscribed  "  to  the  re 
covery  and  security  of  freedom  in  Kansas,"  as  he 
had  previously  said  to  the  Legislature,  "Whatever 
Massachusetts  can  give,  let  it  all  go  to  suffering 
Kansas."  These  refusals  only  made  the  common 
wealth  all  the  more  eager  to  do  honour  to  her  hero. 
The  public  reception  given  him  was  an  ovation  in 


120  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

every  sense  of  the  word,  but  it  was  not  shared  by  all 
the  people  ;  Boston  still  turned  a  cold  shoulder  to  the 
anti-slavery  champion.  During  the  reception  every 
house  on  Beacon  Street,  except  those  of  Prescott  and 
Samuel  Appleton,  tightly  closed  its  blinds,  that  it 
might  publicly  show  its  disapproval.  The  scene  at 
the  State  House,  where  the  public  exercises  were 
held  in  the  open  air,  was  beyond  description,  and 
nothing  was  left  undone  that  might  be  done  to  show 
the  feeling  of  the  state.  The  men  who  ordered  and 
arranged  this  remarkable  demonstration  still  count  it 
one  of  the  memorable  deeds  of  long  lives,  and  still 
rank  its  hero  as  among  the  chief  of  their  heroes.  One 
of  them,  then  distinguished  as  a  scholar,  and  since 
high  in  the  counsels  of  the  church,  looking  back 
over  the  years,  counts  Sumner  among  the  greatest 
men  in  our  history.  The  words  which  Professor 
Huntington  used  in  his  welcome  on  that  occasion 
may  well  close  this  account  of  the  most  important 
circumstance  of  Charles  Sumner's  life  :  — 

"  He  returns  to  his  friends ;  but  his  friends  are  wher 
ever  justice  is  revered.  He  returns  to  his  neighbours  ; 
but  he  has  a  neighbour  in  every  victim  of  wrong  through 
out  the  world.  He  returns  to  the  state  that  intrusted 
her  interests  to  his  charge, — her  faithful  steward,  her 
eloquent  and  fearless  advocate,  her  honoured  guest,  her 
beloved  son." 


ELECTION  OF  BUCHANAN.  121 


CHAPTER   XII. 

1856-1859. 

ELECTION   OF  BUCHANAN. SUMNER'S   SECOND  ELECTION 

TO    SENATE.  LIFE    ABROAD. RECOVERY. 

THE  last  half  of  the  year  1856  was  not  only  a  time 
of  much  importance  to  the  country,  but  to  Mr.  Sum- 
ner  personally.     Indeed,  it  was  largely  because  it  was 
a  critical  time  in  national  affairs  that  the  assault  upon 
Sumner  created  a  crisis  and  became  of  such  public 
importance.     Kansas,  in  a  worse  case  than  ever  be 
fore,  was  torn  with  what  was  in  reality  a  fierce  guerilla 
warfare.      The  sacking  of  the  free-state  to\vns,  Law 
rence  and  Ossawatomie,   and  the   dispersion  of  the 
Legislature,  had  been  followed  by  a  sort  of  armed  truce 
until  Congress  should  fight  out  the  same  battle.     The 
House,  with  a  bare  anti-slavery  majority,  bravely  and 
by  the  hardest  held  its  own  against  the  strong  pro- 
slavery  Senate ;  but  the  legislative  fight  was  all  the 
more  difficult  because  it  was  again  the   time  of  a 
presidential  contest,  and  the  pulse  of  Congress  rose 
and  fell  with  the   fortunes    of  political  parties  and 
the  fevers  of  the  country.     Such  were  the  divisions 
that  five  presidential  conventions  were  held,  and  four 
tickets  nominated.     The  Democrats  threw  over  both 
Pierce  and  Douglas  for  the  non-committal  and  un- 


122  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

committed  Buchanan,  and  joined  with  him  on  the 
ticket  John  C.  Breckenridge.  The  new  Republican 
party  met  for  the  first  time  in  national  convention  and 
nominated  Fremont  and  Dayton,  while  among  their 
rejected  candidates  for  Vice-President  were  Banks, 
Sumner,  and  Lincoln. 

The  Know-Nothings  split  in  two  parts  over  slavery, 
the  Abolitionists  eventually  following  their  candidate 
Speaker  Banks  into  the  Republican  ranks,  and  the 
pro-slavery  men  uniting  with  the  small  remnant  of 
Whigs  on  Fillmore.  Fremont  speedily  gathered  to 
himself  all  the  anti-slavery  elements;  and  although 
Buchanan's  election  was  a  foregone  conclusion,  it 
was  a  matter  of  general  surprise  that  the  Republican 
strength  should  count  up  a  million  and  a  half  of  votes. 
A  few  sanguine  souls  like  Sumner  expected  Fremont's 
election.  From  Cresson  Sumner  wrote  to  a  friend 
that  Pennsylvania  would  certainly  vote  the  Republi 
can  ticket,  and  Fremont  would  surely  be  President. 
"  To  this  double  conclusion,"  he  says,  "  I  have  come 
slowly,  but  I  now  rest  in  it  confidently  !  "  Political 
sagacity  was  the  least  of  the  great  statesman's  qualifi 
cations.  Yet  to  such  an  extent  had  the  anti-slavery 
sentiment  increased  that  both  sides  felt  it  must  be 
reckoned  with,  and  all  other  questions  of  public 
policy  were  set  aside  for  the  discussion  of  slavery ; 
every  Republican  orator  urged  the  cause  of  freedom, 
and  Southern  Democrats  did  not  hesitate  to  apply  the 
threat  of  disunion  to  scourge  Northern  patriots  into 
their  ranks.  The  Southern  governors  held  a  conference 
to  decide  the  course  of  their  section  should  Fremont 
be  chosen.  In  many  ways  the  situation  grew  dra- 


SECOND   ELECTION  TO  SENATE.  123 

matic,  and  took  on  that  critical  and  exciting  phase 
which  culminated  in  Buchanan's  administration. 

In  this  time  of  political  uncertainty  Sumner,  doomed 
to  all  inaction  but  that  of  an  occasional  letter,  was 
also  met  with  the  personal  excitements  of  the  pre 
liminary  contest  for  his  re-election.  By  a  curious 
circumstance  the  caning  occurred  just  at  the  close  of 
his  first  term ;  it  was  in  some  sort  a  climax  for  his  six 
years  of  battle.  But  it  had  a  more  direct  mission 
politically;  it  was  beyond  doubt  the  cause  of  his 
second  election  to  the  Senate.  Massachusetts,  as 
usual,  felt  more  of  the  Northern  political  upturnings 
than  most  of  her  sister  states.  In  1850,  Sumner  was 
elected,  it  will  be  remembered,  by  a  coalition  between 
the  Democrats  and  Free-Soilers,  voting  against  the 
Whigs.  After  two  years  of  that  rule,  Massachusetts 
returned  to  her  Whig  allegiance,  and  two  years  later, 
in  1854,  was  swept  off  her  feet  by  the  Know-Nothing 
excitement,  that  party  carrying  every  town  in  the 
state  but  one,  and  choosing  so  strong  a  Legislature 
that  in  the  House  there  were  only  two  men  not  of  the 
prevailing  party,  —  a  Legislature  which  chose  Henry 
Wilson  to  the  Senate.  And  now,  in  1856,  Massachu 
setts  was  still  a  Know-Nothing  state,  having  distinctly 
refused  to  become  Republican  the  previous  year,  and 
her  Legislature  was,  to  speak  broadly,  still  of  that  po 
litical  faith.  This  party  had  no  affiliations  for  Sum 
ner,  with  his  love  of  foreign  life  and  his  anti-slavery 
desires.  On  the  contrary,  he  had  vigorously  opposed 
it  all  through  the  campaign  of  1854,  entirely  disre 
garding  the  effect  on  his  own  re-election  the  next 
season.  Whether  it  was  sublime  disregard  of  conse- 


124  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

quences  or  extreme  self-appreciation  that  made  Sum- 
ner  so  frequently  forget  all  personal  consequences  in 
marching  straight  on  his  determined  way,  each  must 
decide  for  himself;  but  as  a  fact  in  this  case  it  put 
his  re-election  out  of  the  question,  and  no  one  out 
side  a  small  circle  of  friends  thought  of  it  as  a  possible 
contingency.  Preston  Brooks's  beating  changed  all 
that.  It  changed  the  political  complexion  of  Massa 
chusetts  for  one  thing.  The  nascent  Republican  party 
came  suddenly  into  being,  and  gave  Fremont  a  ma 
jority  of  two  to  one  over  Buchanan  and  Fillmore. 
The  blows  that  struck  Sumner  fell  upon  the  common 
wealth,  and  to  her  it  seemed  they  were  struck  by  the 
right  arm  of  slavery  itself.  All  subterfuges  fell  from 
her  political  eyes.  Even  Boston,  the  stronghold  of 
the  old  conservative  Whig  elements,  no  longer  hesi 
tated  to  place  herself  strongly  beside  the  anti-slavery 
men  in  her  midst.  At  last  the  excited  Abolition  sen 
timent,  always  so  strong  and  active  in  that  state, 
became  truly  representative.  When  the  new  Legisla 
ture  met  in  January,  1857,  it  was  of  but  one  mind  as 
to  the  Senator ;  Sumner  received  all  but  twenty-two 
votes  out  of  the  nearly  four  hundred,  although  his 
opponents  made  the  most  of  his  disabled  condition, 
and  even  declared  that  he  did  not  desire  re-election. 
How  completely  this  was  a  revolution  is  curiously 
shown  by  a  story  much  current  in  local  political  cir 
cles  and  entirely  credited  by  those  in  a  position  best 
calculated  to  know  whereof  they  spoke.  When  Sum 
ner  was  struck  down  in  May,  1856,  the  Know-Nothing 
Legislature  of  Massachusetts  was  still  in  its  last  days, 
but  actually  on  the  point  of  closing  its  session.  On 


SECOND  ELECTION  TO  SENATE.          125 

one  pretext  or  another,  it  was  said,  Governor  Gardner 
kept  this  Legislature  waiting  nearly  a  fortnight,  that  the 
result  of  the  Senator's  injuries  might  appear.  His 
death  was  daily  expected ;  and  if  this  occurred  while 
the  Legislature  was  in  session,  there  was  no  doubt  it 
would  elect  as  his  successor  the  Know-Nothing  Gov 
ernor,  —  Gardner  himself.  If,  however,  such  an  event 
should  occur  after  its  adjournment,  it  was  hardly 
possible  for  that  official  to  appoint  himself  to  the 
coveted  office.  But  the  ten  days'  delay  proved  the 
vitality  of  Sumner's  constitution ;  and  the  next  elec 
tion  saw  the  senatorial  aspirations  of  the  American 
party  in  Massachusetts  buried  with  it. 

It  is  never  quite  possible  to  estimate  beforehand 
the  strength  of  sentiment,  and  Sumner's  friend, 
Mr.  Welling,  becoming  alarmed  at  what  he  heard  of 
a  secret  movement  to  defeat  Sumner  on  the  ground 
that  he  was  injured  beyond  recovery,  wrote  him  beg 
ging  him  for  some  personal  action  in  the  matter.  To 
this  he  replied  in  a  letter  containing  the  following 
passage  characteristic  of  many  things  in  the  man  : 

BOSTON,  22  December,  1856. 
Just  seven  months  since  my  disability. 

MY  DEAR  WELLING,  —  When  chosen  to  my  present 
place,  I  had  never  held  office  of  any  kind.  I  was  brought 
forward  against  my  often  declared  wishes,  and  during  the 
long  contest  that  ensued  constantly  refused  to  furnish  any 
pledge  or  explanation,  or  to  do  anything  even  to  the  ex 
tent  of  walking  across  my  office,  —  determined  that  the 
office  should  absolutely  and  in  every  respect  seek  me, 
and  that  I  would  in  no  respect  seek  the  office.  This  was 
six  years  ago.  I  see  no  occasion,  nor  if  there  were  occa- 


126  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

sion,  should  I  be  willing  now  to  depart  from  the  rule  of 
independence  which  I  then  prescribed  to  myself.  I 
make  no  inquiries  in  regard  to  the  course  of  the  Legis 
lature,  and  of  course  I  make  no  suggestions  ;  nor  shall  I 
do  anything  directly  or  indirectly  to  affect  its  action.  If 
I  am  chosen  again,  it  will  be  as  I  was  before,  without 
any  act  or  word  or  hint  from  me. 

To  the  men  who  were  expected  to  work  hard  and 
long  for  Mr.  Sumner's  sake,  these  constant  refusals  to 
do  anything  for  himself  must  often  have  seemed 
supercilious ;  and  they  lose  something  of  their  effect, 
moreover,  when  it  is  remembered  that  it  was  still  the 
dignified  tradition  of  Massachusetts  that  a  candidate 
for  senator  should  take  no  part  in  advocating  his  own 
claims.  Such  a  course  was  likely  to  hinder  rather 
than  help  his  election.  Nevertheless,  Sumner,  how 
ever  temperament  may  have  biassed  him  and  custom 
hindered  action,  was  altogether  sincere  in  supposing 
himself  indifferent  to  office.  If  some  of  his  contem 
poraries  and  most  of  the  men  of  a  later  generation 
are  of  a  different  opinion  as  to  his  ambition  and  his 
efforts,  that  does  not  at  all  detract  from  his  own  esti 
mate  of  his  course. 

Notwithstanding  all  his  resting  and  his  real  im 
provement,  health  did  not  come  back  for  the  asking. 
The  strength  which  he  gained  in  the  Alleghanies  was 
not  sufficient  for  the  cares  and  excitements  of  Boston ; 
and  it  was  but  half  an  existence  he  lived  among  his 
books  and  his  friends,  and  on  the  edges  of  the  sena 
torial  campaign.  The  nerves  of  the  spine  were  so 
affected  that  at  first  he  could  not  walk  across  the 
room,  and  the  injury  to  the  brain  caused  most  acute 


LIFE  ABROAD.  127 

agony  on  any  attempt  to  use  it ;  he  "  looked  like  an 
old  man  "  to  his  friends  in  Philadelphia.  In  Novem 
ber,  private  sorrow  was  added  to  his  other  burdens  by 
the  loss  at  sea  of  Albert  Sumner  and  his  whole  family, 
—  a  heavy  loss  to  Charles  Sumner.  During  the  winter, 
though  physically  much  better,  his  brain  still  refused 
the  slightest  draft  upon  it,  and  notwithstanding  his 
repeated  determination  to  begin  his  labours  anew,  a 
single  day  in  the  Senate  —  the  last  of  his  old  term  — 
was  all  his  broken  nerves  allowed.  Sumner  found 
himself  at  the  first  trial  absolutely  unable  for  any 
mental  exertion  whatever.  He  only  waited,  there 
fore,  to  take  his  new  oath  of  office,  on  the  day  of 
Buchanan's  inauguration,  before  sailing  for  France  to 
seek  more  complete  rest. 

Although  Sumner  went  abroad  for  the  few  months 
of  the  vacation,  and  made  a  second  brief  effort  to  take 
up  his  senatorial  duties  at  the  close  of  the  year,  it  was 
more  than  two  years  before  he  was  able  to  work  again. 
During  that  time  Massachusetts  gloried  in  keeping 
one  of  her  senatorial  seats  vacant,  rightly  judging  its 
silence  a  better  argument  than  the  most  eloquent 
words.  The  traveller,  so  far  as  health  permitted,  re 
peated  the  pleasures  and  triumphs  of  twenty  years 
before.  But  now  he  was  also  of  the  world  of  action, 
and  himself  had  a  past  of  which  men  might  well  in 
quire.  Now  he  was  a  part  of  the  political  life  of  his 
own  land  and  generation,  and  —  no  longer  a  learner 
and  listener  only — discussed  or  defended  statescraft 
and  policies.  At  first  he  lived  an  invalid  life  in  Paris, 
but  was  shortly  apparently  himself,  so  that  he  put 
his  strength  to  trial  among  his  old  haunts.  Life  in 


128  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

Europe  was  the  old  story  over  again.  If  some  whom 
he  met  once  more  "seemed  changed  in  mood  and 
character,"  it  is  not  impossible  that  the  observer  had 
changed  also.  In  France  his  invalidism  was  en 
livened  by  daily  visits  from  De  Tocqueville,  and  he 
discussed  eloquence  over  a  dinner-table  with  Guizot, 
Thiers,  Circourt,  Montalembert,  and  "several  more 
of  us,"  where  the  talk  was  of  speech-making  as  an  art. 
Sumner's  own  share  in  this  conversation  is  not  reported, 
but  as  a  matter  of  fact  his  great  speeches  were  not 
only  written,  but  either  committed  or  read.  A  long 
time  associate  of  Sumner  still  tells  of  the  shockjfc 
gave  him  when  he  first  learned  that  this  great  mani 
memorized  his  orations.  Going  to  Washington  for 
the  first  time  from  the  Baltimore  convention,  where 
he  alone  among  the  Massachusetts  delegation  had 
voted  for  Scott,  Sumner  took  him  to  call  on  Seward 
as  a  friend  of  General  Scott.  Seward  shortly  asked 
when  they  were  to  have  Sumner's  expected  speech, 
and  was  answered  that  it  was  all  written,  but  it  was 
not  yet  committed  !  At  a  later  date,  however,  this 
fashion  —  then  almost  universal  in  this  country,  as 
these  famous  Frenchmen  declared  it  was  in  France  — 
disappeared,  and  Sumner  read  his  speeches  from 
manuscript,  or  more  often  from  printed  slips. 

In  England,  which  he  sought  at  an  early  date,  the 
traveller  was  again  the  guest  of  the  great  country- 
houses,  and  discussed  slavery  with  Argyll  and  Shaftes- 
bury  and  Brougham.  This  question  was  about  to  take 
on  a  different  form,  when  England's  ostentatious  de 
sires  for  freedom  must  meet  the  sharp  test  of  the 
pocket,  —  a  practical  test  she  sadly  failed  to  endure. 


LIFE  ABROAD.  129 

Already  the  situation  had  greatly  changed  in  a  short 
time,  and  these  statesmen  had  occasion  for  discus 
sion  far  more  complicated  than  theory.  But  if  public 
affairs  claimed  a  large  share  of  attention,  letters  and 
literature  were  not  neglected.  Sumner's  experiences 
ranged  over  so  wide  a  field  as  lay  between  Thackeray 
and  Macaulay.  Who  would  not  listen  in  Lord  Stan 
hope's  library  when  Sumner  and  Macaulay  spent  a 
morning  together  "  browsing  among  the  books,  pulling 
them  down,  and  talking  them  over"?  Sumner  was 
much  in  Scotland  also,  and  under  the  roofs  of  the 
Duke  of  Sutherland,  Lord  Aberdeen,  or  Sir  William 
Sterling  Maxwell  again  saw  leisure  in  its  finest  sort. 
He  made  a  trip  to  Normandy  to  visit  De  Tocqueville, 
on  whose  walls  he  found  companion  pictures  of  Wash 
ington  and  Hamilton,  and  another  to  Guernsey  for  a 
visit  to  Victor  Hugo.  He  caught  a  glimpse  of  the 
Pyrenees,  and  he  was  many  weeks  among  the  Alps. 
In  December  he  came  home  to  try  his  hand  at  work 
again ;  but  it  was  quite  too  soon,  and  the  winter  en 
suing  was  spent  in  the  futile  attempt  to  perform  the 
duties  of  his  position  or  to  regain  his  longed-for 
health.  In  the  last  effort  he  spent  his  time  largely 
among  his  friends  in  Boston,  where  he  beguiled  many 
hours  with  the  Gray  collection  of  engravings  at  Har 
vard  College,  and  developed  that  taste  for  engravings 
which  became  one  of  his  greatest  pleasures. 

On  the  anniversary  of  his  assault  he  again  sailed 
for  Europe.  This  second  half  of  his  two  years'  exile 
was  to  have  its  own  distinction  among  all  his  for 
eign  tours.  Immediately  upon  his  arrival  in  Paris  in 
the  spring  of  1858,  he  sought  Dr.  Brown-Se"quard's 
9 


130  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

advice  and  care.  His  treatment  proved  to  be  of  the 
heroic  sort ;  and  in  view  of  the  importance  attached 
by  the  public  to  this  experience,  it  is  justifiable  to 
quote  a  part  of  the  great  specialist's  somewhat  lengthy 
account  of  his  distinguished  patient.  In  a  lecture 
given  in  Boston  in  1871,  he  said,  — 

"  When  Mr.  Sumner  first  came  under  my  care,  he  was 
suffering  from  derangement  of  some  fibres  of  the  nerves. 
As  you  all  know,  he  had  received  a  blow  upon  the  head. 
His  spine,  as  he  was  sitting,  was  bent  in  two  places.  His 
bent  spine  had  produced  the  effect  of  a  sprain ;  and  when 
I  saw  him  in  Paris,  he  had  recovered  altogether  from  the 
first  effect  of  the  blow.  He  had  then  two  troubles;  one 
was  that  he  could  not  make  use  of  his  brain  at  all.  He 
could  not  read  a  newspaper  or  write  a  letter  ;  he  was  in 
a  fearful  state.  It  seemed  to  him  as  if  his  head  would 
explode,  as  if  there  was  some  great  force  in  it  pushing 
the  parts  away  from  each  other.  Indeed,  his  emotions 
were  fearful  to  me.  Often,  in  conversation,  if  anything 
was  said  calling  for  any  degree  of  deep  thought,  he  suf 
fered  intensely  immediately,  so  that  we  had  to  be  ex 
tremely  careful  with  him.  He  had  another  trouble;  .  .  . 
it  was  a  sprain  at  the  level  of  the  last  dorsal  vertebra.  The 
irritation  there  was  intense,  and  any  motion  was  extremely 
hard.  When  he  walked,  he  had  to  push  forward  his  right 
foot  and  then  his  left,  holding  on  all  the  while  to  his  back 
with  both  hands  to  relieve  the  pain.  ...  I  told  him  the 
best  plan  of  treatment  would  consist  in  the  application  of 
moxa,  — the  most  painful  application  to  the  skin.  I  asked 
him  if  he  would  not  take  chloroform  to  dull  the  pain  or 
remove  it  altogether.  I  shall  always  remember  his  impres 
sive  assent  when  I  had  said  that.  He  said,  '  Doctor,  if  you 
can  say  positively  that  I  shall  derive  just  as  much  benefit 
if  I  take  chloroform  as  if  I  do  not,  then  I  will  take  chlo 
roform;  but  if  there  is  to  be  any  degree  whatever  of 


LIFE   ABROAD.  131 

greater  amelioration  in  case  I  don't  take  chloroform,  then 
I  shall  not  take  it.'  ...  I  told  him  there  would  be  more 
good  if  he  did  n't  take  the  chloroform.  So  I  had  to  sub 
mit  him  to  the  martyrdom  of  the  greatest  suffering  that 
can  be  inflicted  by  medical  practice,  and  burned  him.  I 
thought  that  after  the  torture  of  the  first  time,  he  would 
then  resort  to  chloroform ;  but  for  five  times  after,  in  ac 
cordance  with  his  own  determination,  the  operation  was 
performed  without  it.  I  never  saw  a  patient  before  that 
would  submit  to  such  a  thing." 

Dr.  Brown-Se"quard  attributes  this  heroic  endurance 
partly  to  Sumner's  intense  desire  to  return  to  his  work 
at  a  time  so  exciting  and  so  critical,  and  partly  to  his 
sensitiveness  to  the  abuse  heaped  upon  him  as  a 
coward  and  an  idler.  For  these  reasons,  "  he  passed 
through  all  that  terrible  and  intense  suffering,"  says 
the  Doctor,  "  the  greatest  I  have  ever  had  the  misfor 
tune  to  inflict,  be  it  upon  man  or  animal." 

Something  of  our  fierce  ancestors  lingers  about  us 
yet,  for  nothing  appeals  to  men  more  strongly  than 
physical  courage.  And  in  Sumner's  case  this  deter 
mination  to  suffer  was  joined  to  a  high  moral  courage. 
Moreover,  he  was,  men  thought,  a  type  of  the  stern 
Northern  purpose  and  an  outward  and  visible  sign 
of  the  bloody  recklessness  of  the  South.  When  the 
sharp  treatment  he  was  enduring  became  known,  sym 
pathy  entered  in,  and  an  admiring  horror.  Thus  he 
became  the  hero  of  the  whole  North.  All  his  weak 
nesses  and  all  men's  animosities  were  forgotten,  and 
this  champion  of  the  cause  became  a  thousand  times 
the  greater  champion  by  reason  of  his  wounds.  For 
Sumner  himself  it  was  the  most  fortunate  of  events. 
Other  men's  labours  contributed  to  the  result  even 


132  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

more  than  his ;  other  men's  voices  were  as  eloquent 
or  more  important ;  but  until  the  death  of  Lincoln,  no 
other  statesman  was  to  be  a  victim.  Here  and  now 
at  the  beginning  he  alone  suffered,  and  in  a  romantic 
fashion,  he  was  singled  out  from  his  fellows.  There 
after  his  name  was  clothed  with  a  glamour  it  never 
lost.  He  was  the  first  conspicuous  martyr ;  and  among 
martyrs  as  elsewhere,  to  him  that  hath  it  shall  be 
given.  The  rank  and  file  are  forgotten  in  the  glory 
of  the  leaders,  so  that  to  the  public  mind  he  became 
the  first  saint  in  the  calendar  of  the  war.  In  esti 
mating  his  influence,  —  always  an  influence  over  the 
minds  of  men  rather  than  over  their  deeds,  —  this  must 
not  be  forgotten.  The  enormous  power  of  sentiment 
was  added  to  all  he  did  or  said,  —  giving  him  an  ad 
vantage  no  one  else  possessed,  until  in  some  quarters 
his  words  had  the  force  of  an  inspired  and  heaven- 
dedicated  authority.  Particularly  was  this  true  among 
that  element  in  New  England  and  elsewhere  best  de 
scribed  as  the  Puritan  element.  Many  things  in  their 
hero  appealed  especially  to  those  men  and  women : 
his  high  moral  standard,  his  strong  devotion  to  prin 
ciple,  his  ignorance  or  deliberate  disregard  of  practi 
cal  possibilities  and  of  consequences,  his  illogical  logic 
and  persistent  blindness  to  any  course  but  the  one  he 
chose  to  consider  abstractly  right,  his  sacrifices  to 
humanity,  and  now  his  suffering  for  the  cause  they  had 
so  much  at  heart.  Withal  he  was  no  common  soldier, 
but  a  very  splendid  knight,  with  his  literary  attain 
ments,  his  social  successes,  his  foreign  friends,  his 
handsome  presence,  and  his  eloquent  speech.  The 
man  his  admirers  imagined  was  perhaps,  after  all, 


LIFE  ABROAD.  133 

not  quite  the  man  his  associates  knew,  but  even  his 
faults  were  in  some  cases  special  claims  to  their  regard. 
They  took  him  at  his  own  estimate,  and  added  to  it 
their  own,  until  he  became  a  very  demi-god.  And  as 
the  Puritan  element  always  formed  the  very  backbone 
of  the  American  people,  it  was  specially  prominent 
and  specially  forceful  in  the  period  of  moral  upheaval 
which  preceded  the  war.  Hence  the  great  influence 
exerted  by  Sumner  finds  its  explanation  not  only  in 
the  man  himself  and  his  words,  but  also  in  the  soil 
wherein  the  good  seed  was  sown. 

It  is  unnecessary  to  follow  in  detail  the  further 
course  of  this  European  experience.  It  included  a 
winter  in  the  south  of  France,  at  Montpellier,  where 
he  amused  himself  with  four  different  courses  of  lec 
tures,  with  reading  "furiously,"  and  with  the  usual 
friendships,  that  not  only  were  the  solace  of  the  hour, 
but  a  lasting  possession.  It  was  during  this  double 
trip  to  Europe,  too,  that  Sumner  began  to  collect  the 
pictures  and  bric-a-brac  of  various  kinds  and  quali 
ties  which  became  such  a  passion  with  him.  A  per 
sonal  connection  of  some  sort  was  usually  the  first 
cause  of  Sumner's  interest  in  art  as  well  as  in  other 
things.  He  found  in  Montpellier  a  picture  gallery  in 
which  he  specially  delighted.  In  his  letters  he  dwelt 
upon  a  certain  Greuze,  an  "  exquisite  "  Salvator,  the 
"  beautiful  productions  "  of  Poussin,  Cuyp,  and  Te- 
niers.  He  bought  the  copy  of  Tintoretto's  Saint 
Mark  which  had  such  special  value  to  him,  and  he 
hung  his  walls  from  time  to  time  with  pictures  of  the 
artists  he  then  learned  to  love.  Besides  this  winter 
of  mental  pleasure  and  physical  pain,  there  was  much 


134  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

travel,  especially  in  France  and  Italy,  "  endless  baths 
at  Dieppe  and  endless  dinners  at  London."  Magenta 
and  Solferino  filled  him  with  excitement,  and  he  re 
joiced  in  the  freedom  of  Italy.  De  Tocqueville,  so 
lately  his  host,  ended  a  long  life ;  and  at  home  his 
circle  grew  smaller,  especially  in  the  death  of  Pres- 
cott,  which  touched  him  closely.  During  this  period 
of  enforced  idleness  he  was  gratified  at  the  recog 
nition  given  him  by  both  the  great  American  col 
leges,  Yale  and  his  own  Harvard,  in  conferring  the 
degree  of  Doctor  of  Laws.  At  last  Brown-Se"quard 
pronounced  the  cure  complete ;  and  Sumner  arrived 
in  Boston  in  December,  1859,  "looking  hale  and 
hearty,  and  calling  himself  a  well  man." 


POLITICAL  AND  SOCIAL  CONDITIONS.      135 


CHAPTER    XIII. 

1860,  1861. 

POLITICAL     AND     SOCIAL     CONDITIONS     ON     RETURN     TO 

WASHINGTON.  —  SPEECH    ON    KANSAS. SUMNER    AND 

SEWARD. 

WHEN  Sumner  arrived  in  Boston,  ready  again  to 
take  part  in  the  drama  already  set  upon  the  stage,  he 
was  just  in  time  for  the  bitter  end  of  the  John  Brown 
raid,  with  its  special  issues  and  alarms  among  his 
neighbours  in  Massachusetts.  It  was  little  wonder 
that  he  went  to  Washington  with  "  sad  forebodings." 
History  had  been  making  fast  during  his  absence, 
though  with  little  outward  change  in  the  incidents. 
The  time  that  Sumner  spent  in  Europe  was  a  time  of 
development  rather  than  catastrophe.  It  was  the 
time  of  Buchanan's  administration,  —  a  period  of 
division  and  determination  everywhere,  and  a  season 
of  special  preparation  among  the  Southern  leaders. 
There  have  been  few  periods  more  important  to 
our  history,  and  few  more  exciting  to  those  in  the 
thick  of  affairs ;  yet  these  four  years  are  so  over 
whelmed  by  those  which  followed  as  sometimes  to 
be  forgotten. 

All  the  political  and  legislative  struggle  over  Kan 
sas  had  brought  about  nothing  more  of  legal  result 


136  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

than  the  enforced  adoption  of  the  Lecompton  con 
stitution,  followed  by  its  speedy  repudiation ;  but  it 
was  becoming  plain  to  the  people  of  the  South,  as  it 
long  had  been  plain  to  their  leaders,  that  only  two 
courses  were  open  to  them,  —  either  to  force  the 
North  to  a  national  sanction  of  slavery,  or  to  force  a 
division  of  the  country  into  two  trans-continental  na 
tions,  the  one  a  slave  state,  and  the  other  free.  To 
this  double  issue  the  struggle  over  Kansas  was  di 
rected.  If  it  might  be  a  slave  state  in  the  Union, 
very  well ;  if  not,  stretching  westward  to  California, 
it  very  nearly  completed  the  southern  boundary.  To 
the  end  of  more  slaves  for  use  in  these  territories, 
there  was  much  talk  of  reviving  the  slave-trade  ;  and 
some  beginnings  were  actually  made,  skilfully  arranged 
to  appeal  to  the  multitude,  by  bringing  in  cheap  ne 
groes  for  the  people.  Still  deeper  plans,  looking  to  a 
possible  future,  had  long  been  attempted  in  the  fili 
bustering  expeditions  and  diplomatic  conferences 
directed  toward  the  seizure  of  Nicaragua  or  Cuba. 
These  attacks  upon  our  southern  boundaries  were  so 
far  the  work  of  the  government  that  Sumner  declared 
to  a  friend  that  his  first  experience  of  the  secret  ses 
sions  of  the  Senate  had  seemed  to  him  like  a  council  of 
pirates.  These  Southern  publicists,  whatever  we  may 
think  of  their  doctrine,  were  statesmen  in  the  largest 
sense  of  the  word,  —  they  saw  clearly  what  must 
come ;  they  balanced  probabilities,  and  weighed 
measures ;  they  matured  careful  and  long-reaching 
plans ;  and  they  educated  their  public.  They  played 
the  great  game  of  politics  with  states  for  counters ; 
but  all  their  dice  were  loaded. 


POLITICAL  AND  SOCIAL  CONDITIONS.     137 

Two  events  of  small  beginnings  grew  to  such  large 
results  as  to  require  more  than  a  passing  notice.  The 
case  of  the  slave  Dred  Scott,  carried  by  his  owner 
back  and  forth  between  free  and  slave  states,  was 
technically  a  simple  case  of  assault  and  battery 
against  the  owner  who  whipped  him  in  Missouri.  A 
single  negro  suing  in  a  slave  state  for  an  offence  so 
trifling  in  the  eyes  of  the  law  or  of  society  certainly 
seemed  a  matter  of  small  consequence ;  but  all  the 
questions  that  excited  men's  minds  on  the  subject  lay 
folded  within  it,  —  the  rights  of  a  black  man  (if  in 
deed  he  had  any)  ;  the  rights  of  the  slaveholder  on 
free  soil  and  in  the  territories ;  the  rights  of  the 
states  within  their  own  borders ;  the  rights  of  the  na 
tion.  Sent  from  court  to  court  through  years  of  vary 
ing  fortunes,  it  reached  a  determination  in  March, 
1857,  Chief- Justice  Taney  delivering  the  decision  of 
the  Supreme  Court  that  that  tribunal  had  no  jurisdic 
tion;  but  lest  that  should  end  the  case,  he  went 
outside,  and  proffered  the  views  of  the  court  on 
every  count  in  favour  of  slavery,  summing  up  the 
matter  that  the  Constitution  distinctly  upheld  slavery 
as  a  national  institution.  This  and  the  dissenting 
opinion  of  Justice  Curtis,  which  took  exactly  opposite 
ground,  became  the  great  expositions  of  the  different 
views  of  the  sections.  The  issue  was  drawn  so  clearly 
that  it  could  not  be  mistaken.1 

1  It  is  a  curious  and  but  little  known  fact  that  Dred  Scott 
himself  had  fallen  by  inheritance  to  an  estate  partly  owned  by 
the  wife  of  a  Massachusetts  congressman,  who  was  at  that  time 
enthusiastically  fighting  the  battles  for  freedom  in  the  House 
of  Representatives.  The  slave  was  afterward  manumitted  by 
the  estate. 


138  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

The  effect  of  this  decision  on  the  North  was  be 
yond  estimate ;  but  the  South  was  brought  to  a  still 
greater  heat  by  an  occurrence  of  a  different  nature, 
in  which  the  actors  were  of  equally  small  consequence, 
—  the  John  Brown  raid.  Among  the  Kansas  emi 
grants  was  this  Massachusetts  fanatic  of  freedom, 
scarcely  known  in  the  state  of  his  birth,  and  dwell 
ing  for  some  years  in  a  remote  corner  of  the  Adi- 
rondacks,  which  he  had  chosen  as  a  fit  place  for  a 
terminus  of  the  "  underground  railway."  Undistin 
guished  even  in  Kansas,  his  very  name  almost  com 
mon  property,  he  shortly  became  either  a  hero  or  a 
criminal  with  an  imperishable  fame,  for  his  hand 
lighted  the  war-torch,  though  its  flash  was  premature 
and  speedily  smothered.  Like  all  Puritans,  he  be 
lieved  right  would  not  only  triumph  in  the  end,  but 
that  it  would  triumph  to-day  if  men  could  be  forced 
to  obey.  The  gospel  of  the  sword  was  to  him  the 
only  reasonable  gospel,  since  right  was  absolute,  and 
could  be  interpreted  in  but  one  way.  Believing  that 
no  Southerner  could  fail  to  know  his  course  wrong, 
John  Brown  honestly  thought  the  South  fighting 
against  its  own  conscience,  and  therefore  weak.  Fur 
thermore,  accustomed  as  he  was  to  deal  with  those 
stronger  souls  among  the  blacks  who  achieved  free 
dom,  he  dreamed  the  whole  race  eager  to  rise  and 
ready  to  fight ;  and  since  Slavery  saw  fit  to  burn  and 
kill  in  Kansas,  he  knew  no  reason  why  Freedom  could 
not  do  likewise  in  Virginia.  Thinking  thus,  and 
helped  on  by  Massachusetts  counsel  and  Massachu 
setts  money,  he  deliberately  gave  himself  up  to  mar 
tyrdom,  and  with  a  sublime  enthusiasm  undertook  to 


POLITICAL   AND  SOCIAL    CONDITIONS.     139 

incite  a  general  insurrection  of  the  slaves.  His  futile 
attempt  to  capture  the  United  States  Arsenal  at 
Harper's  Ferry,  in  1859,  with  less  than  a  dozen 
companions  and  curiously  childish  preparations, 
could  have  but  one  result.  He  was  captured,  tried, 
and  executed ;  but  the  South  was  on  fire  with  alarm. 
As  a  matter  of  course,  this  seemed  in  its  eyes  the 
beginning  of  a  Northern  plan  for  subjugation  and  de 
struction, —  a  belief  much  fostered  by  the  position 
assumed  by  the  North.  So  strong  was  the  hatred 
of  slavery  in  that  section  that,  upon  every  side,  John 
Brown  was  canonized,  almost  deified.  Although 
his  attempt  was  constantly  declared  foolish  and 
wrong,  his  high  qualities  and  pure  purpose  could  not 
be  eulogized  enough.  So  nice  a  distinction  naturally 
could  not  be  seen  as  far  as  Virginia.  It  was  little 
wonder  that  the  South  thought  him  indorsed  by  the 
North  when  Northern  women  applied  to  Governor 
Wise  for  permission  to  visit  him  in  prison,  Northern 
lawyers  hastened  to  plead  his  cause,  Northern  news 
papers  and  platforms  and  pulpits  apotheosized  his 
splendid  courage  and  heroic  devotion,  and  Northern 
bells  tolled  the  hour  of  his  hanging.  So  while  the 
Dred  Scott  decision  finally  struck  the  scales  off 
Northern  eyes,  the  John  Brown  raid  finally  united 
the  South. 

Politically,  the  situation  was  tense  to  a  degree. 
Although  slavery  was,  as  it  had  been  for  more  than 
a  score  of  years,  the  centre  of  all  things,  the  anti- 
slavery  party  had  become  more  than  respectable  in 
numbers  and  adherents.  The  wave  of  fortune  had 
receded  and  again  returned,  and  Sumner  found  the 


140  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

new  House  of  Representatives  with  a  Republican 
majority.  He  watched  eagerly  the  eight  weeks' 
struggle  in  which  it  tried  to  make  John  Sherman 
Speaker,  and  saw  with  ill-concealed  vexation  the 
twenty-two  Know-Nothings  —  half  of  them  from  his 
own  state  —  dictate  a  different  result ;  but  when  it 
came  to  legislation,  all  the  anti-slavery  elements 
united,  and  the  South  found  itself  confronted  by  a 
strong  and  stern  foe.  Moreover,  if  the  blood  of  these 
Northerners  did  not  run  quite  as  hot  as  that  of  the 
cavaliers,  it  ran  quite  as  strong,  and,  upon  occasion, 
actual  fights  occurred  upon  the  floor  of  the  House 
itself;  and  although  the  Senate  was  more  decorous  in 
act,  it  was  in  a  more  dangerous  mood,  because  here 
the  threats  were  deliberate,  and  they  were  the  utter 
ance  of  plans  only  half  concealed.  In  the  field  of 
national  affairs,  Douglas  split  the  Democratic  party 
into  two  parts  by  his  contradictory  manoeuvring  for 
the  senatorial  election  and  the  presidential  nomina 
tion.  The  national  convention  was  irreconcilably 
divided  by  the  demand  of  the  Southern  wing  that  it 
should  openly  advocate  the  principle  of  slavery  under 
national  protection,  and  by  the  personal  popularity  of 
Douglas  at  the  North.  Three  tickets  finally  resulted, 
—  that  of  the  old  conservative  Whigs,  under  Bell  and 
Everett,  which  upheld  the  Union  at  any  price,  and 
those  bearing  the  names  of  Douglas  and  of  John  C. 
Breckenridge.  To  meet  these,  the  Republicans  threw 
over  Seward,  and  nominated  Lincoln  and  Hamlin. 
But  notwithstanding  the  new  strength  of  that  party, 
its  ticket  was  elected  only  because  of  the  division 
among  its  enemies. 


POLITICAL  AND  SOCIAL   CONDITIONS.     141 

In  1856,  when  Sumner  left  the  capital,  he  had 
few  associates;  when  he  returned  in  1859,  he  came 
back  to  very  different  social  conditions.  The 
Northern  element  in  Congress  had  increased  to  such 
proportions  as  to  make  itself  felt  in  Washington, 
and  the  result  was  a  sharp  division  into  two  dis 
tinct  circles,  —  that  of  the  South,  which  was  "  so 
ciety,"  and  an  anti-slavery  set.  The  administration 
was  strongly  pro-slavery  in  its  sympathies.  President 
Buchanan — that  stateliest  of  gentlemen  —  held  court 
at  the  White  House,  where  he  and  his  beautiful  niece, 
Harriet  Lane,  imported  as  many  of  the  customs  of 
the  English  court  as  they  could  fit  into  the  society 
about  them,  —  a  society,  which,  being  Southern,  was 
essentially  aristocratic.  Never  have  we  had  a  more 
dignified  or  a  more  elegant  White  House.  The 
Cabinet  ministers  were  noted  for  their  entertain 
ments,  and  distinguished  senators  were  not  a  whit 
behind  them.  The  diplomatic  corps  returned  the 
courtesies  heaped  upon  them,  in  lavish  manner. 
Sir  William  Gore  Ousely  brought  Lady  Ousely,  once 
Miss  Van  Ness,  back  to  her  old  friends  in  Wash 
ington,  for  a  season  of  mingled  diplomacy  and 
gayety.  The  Japanese  embassy  furnished  the  ex 
citement  at  one  time  ;  the  Prince  of  Wales  shone, 
a  bright  particular  star,  at  another ;  Fanny  Kemble 
was  the  delight  of  a  season ;  and  Anthony  Trollope 
made  his  famous  visit  to  our  shores.  Scandals  oc 
curred  also,  —  that  last  note  of  fashion.  As  in  past 
years,  the  gayety  centred  around  the  Southern  set ; 
but  now  there  was  also  another  and  an  opposite 
circle  to  divide  the  pleasures  of  life.  Senator  Seward 


142  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

gave  dinners  which  were  quite  the  equal  of  those 
given  by  the  Cabinet.  In  particular,  he  introduced 
Lord  Napier,  Sumner's  friend,  now  British  minister, 
to  the  Republican  circles,  otherwise  likely  to  remain 
unknown  ground  to  him.  Frank  Blair,  one  of  the 
few  Southerners  who  counted  his  country  larger  than 
his  state,  kept  open  house  for  the  Republicans  in 
his  mansion  opposite  the  White  House,  or  at  his 
beautiful  country-place  of  Silver  Spring  (Sumner's 
first  refuge  after  the  attack)  ;  and  his  brilliant  daugh 
ter  helped  her  distinguished  father  and  her  famous 
brothers  make  history  over  many  a  dinner-table,  and 
in  more  than  one  confidential  interview.  Charles 
Francis  Adams,  then  a  congressman  from  Boston, 
was  a  conspicuous  personage,  and  his  wife  a  leader 
of  society  acknowledged  by  both  sets,  —  a  rare  dis 
tinction,  —  while  among  the  young  men  of  that 
world  his  son  and  namesake  figured  prominently. 
Mrs.  Adams  was  the  authority  on  etiquette  for  her 
inexperienced  colleagues ;  but  if  the  points  they  sub 
mitted  were  too  hard  for  her,  she  would  refer  them  to 
Mr.  Sumner  with  the  remark,  "  He  knows  everything 
of  that  kind."  At  that  time,  many  drawing-rooms 
were  open  every  week,  with  a  pleasant  informality 
now  quite  forgotten.  You  might  go  to  the  Sewards* 
on  Friday  nights,  and  Saturday  nights  the  anti- slavery 
men  gathered  at  Israel  Washburn's.  In  the  unpre 
tentious  parlours  of  Gamaliel  Bailey,  on  C  Street, 
was  to  be  found  the  nearest  approach  to  a  salon 
that  Washington  has  ever  seen.  Clever  women  and 
great  men  met  there  for  conversation ;  and  the  bril 
liant  talk,  as  in  the  great  French  houses,  was  all 


POLITICAL  AND  SOCIAL  CONDITIONS.     143 

of  one  mind.  Then  began  also  those  "  evenings " 
in  the  modest  house  on  Twelfth  Street,  where  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Johnson  and  Miss  Donaldson,  from  Phila 
delphia,  made  a  centre  for  Abolitionists  of  the 
deepest  dye.  This  household  was  just  set  up  with 
great  difficulty;  Mrs.  Johnson  was  for  some  time 
obliged  to  do  her  own  work,  since  she  could  not  find 
any  free  negro  to  do  it  for  her.  But  from  that  time 
on  it  was  always  the  resort  of  kindred  souls ;  and 
there  conclaves  were  held  and  political  plans  con 
ceived  of  no  small  importance,  and  there  began 
many  philanthropic  schemes  for  the  benefit  of  the 
despised  black  man.  This  house  was  a  special  haunt 
of  Mr.  Sumner.  Here  he  went  "to  talk  over"  things ; 
here  he  sought  rest;  here  he  met  his  friends,  and 
from  this  household  he  asked  —  and  followed  —  ad 
vice  ;  here  he  found  within  the  circle  of  the  family 
connection  his  own  dear  friends,  the  Furnesses ;  and 
here  came  Garrison  and  Phillips  and  Sanborn  and 
Channing. 

In  these  days,  when  society  turns  its  back  upon 
politics  and  smiles  sweetly  across  the  bloodiest  of 
chasms,  it  is  difficult  to  realize  —  almost  impossible 
to  remember  —  how  sharply  the  lines  were  drawn 
between  these  two  sets.  The  Southern  ladies  often 
refused  to  speak  to  their  Northern  associates,  and 
deliberately  turned  their  backs  upon  the  Yankees; 
an  introduction  was  as  often  the  opportunity  for  a 
snub  as  the  beginning  of  an  acquaintance.  A  child 
of  those  days  still  remembers  wondering  why  this  or 
that  lady  refused  her  hand  to  the  child's  mother,  and 
beginning  at  the  White  House,  why  some  stately  per- 


144  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

sons,  of  much  consequence  in  the  child's  eyes,  were  so 
cool  and  scornful !  The  Northern  congressman  was 
left  to  the  gayeties  of  his  own  circle,  and  was  only  en 
dured  where  official  reasons  required  that  he  should 
be  bidden.  His  children  were  not  much  welcomed 
at  school;  his  boys  felt  themselves  aggrieved,  that 
they  could  not  throw  stones  at  the  little  "  niggers  " 
in  the  street,  —  the  favourite  game  of  their  com 
panions  !  And  this  atmosphere  of  anger  and  hate 
grew  stronger  day  by  day.  When  Sumner  first  came 
back,  it  was  not  at  its  height ;  but  the  next  two 
winters  saw  its  culmination,  until  secession  and  the 
beginning  of  war  cleared  the  air. 

The  social  centre  of  the  city  had  changed  some 
what  since  the  days  of  Webster,  and  the  bare  spaces 
behind  the  avenue  were  slowly  filling  up.  Willard's 
was  now  the  common  resort  of  Northern  travellers, 
though  the  famous  Brown's  Hotel  and  the  National 
still  held  the  Southern  and  Democratic  contingents. 
Mr.  Sumner,  whose  first  lodgings  were  on  E  Street, 
just  above  Sixth,  now  found  an  abiding-place  on  F 
Street,  between  Fourteenth  and  Fifteenth  streets, 
where  he  remained  for  many  years. 

Outwardly  the  city  was  much  the  same.  The 
Virginia  mud,  which  was  shortly  to  become  such  a 
factor  in  the  fortunes  of  war,  still  controlled  the 
streets  of  Washington,  and  the  pigs  and  geese  still 
revelled  in  it,  —  rambling  up  and  down  the  most 
elegant  neighbourhoods,  under  the  very  feet  of  both 
business  and  society,  and  tangling  themselves  in  the 
wheels  of  the  omnibuses.  The  public  buildings 
had  not  added  to  their  number.  The  Washington 


SPEECH  ON  KANSAS.  145 

Monument  was  not  one  stone  nearer  completion  than 
ten  years  before ;  and  the  great  Dome,  half  finished, 
awaited  the  end  of  the  controversy  between  Secretary 
Davis  and  the  sculptor  Crawford  over  the  liberty-cap 
for  the  crown  of  the  bronze  Liberty.  "That,"  said 
the  Secretary,  "  is  a  badge  of  a  freed  slave  ;  we  must 
have  a  helmet ;  "  and  thus  he  sacrificed  beauty,  but 
after  all  builded  better  than  he  knew,  for  before 
Liberty  might  bear  the  badge  of  freedom  over  the 
capital  of  the  United  States,  she  must  go  forth  in 
her  might  to  war. 

Mr.  Sumner's  return  did  not  coincide  exactly  with 
President  Buchanan's  departure.  He  was  at  home 
for  the  last  half  of  that  administration,  and  was  him 
self  a  part  of  that  fearful,  and  never-to-be-forgotten 
time,  —  a  time  when  some  of  those  in  authority  were 
secretly  preparing  for  war,  and  some  who  bore  re 
sponsibility  were  endeavouring  to  defend  themselves 
from  they  knew  not  what,  and  the  power  lay  in  hands 
doing  nothing  and  a  head  trying  to  see  nothing,  and 
all  men  were  anxious,  waiting  in  fearful  hope  or  de 
spairing  terror.  He  re-entered  the  arena  with  one  of 
his  great  speeches.  It  was  on  the  Barbarism  of 
Slavery,  and  he  began  exactly  where  he  left  off. 
In  May,  1856,  he  spoke  on  the  Crime  against  the 
territory  of  Kansas,  and  was  carried  out  of  the 
Senate-chamber  apparently  to  die.  In  June,  1860, 
he  came  back  into  the  field  stronger  than  ever,  with 
a  speech  on  the  admission  of  Kansas  as  a  free  state. 
His  old  antagonist,  Senator  Butler,  and  his  assailant, 
Preston  Brooks,  were  both  dead ;  but  Mason  of  Vir 
ginia  was  still  his  opponent,  and  around  him  the 
10 


146  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

battle  had  been  taken  up  by  R.  M.  T.  Hunter  and 
Robert  Toorabs,  by  Wigfall  and  Lamar,  and  Jefferson 
Davis  and  Chestnut  and  Benjamin.  The  bitterness 
of  his  arraignment  and  the  fierceness  of  his  invective 
had  lost  nothing  by  the  sharp  suffering  of  four  years, 
and  they  had  gained  that  force  which  always  came  to 
Sumner  when  in  his  own  person  he  had  felt  a  diffi 
culty.  If  he  needed  this  spur  fully  to  arouse  him, 
judge  of  the  effect  in  force,  persistence,  and  indomi 
table  hate  produced  by  such  personal  injury  and  insult, 
such  suffering,  as  this  man  had  undergone. 

The  speech  itself  did  not  greatly  differ  from  its 
predecessor  of  four  years  before  except  in  its  inten 
sity;  nothing  could  exceed  that.  As  the  loins  to 
the  little  finger,  so  were  his  direct  illustrations  of  the 
barbarities  constantly  practised  upon  the  helpless 
slaves  to  those  of  his  earlier  speeches,  his  de 
nunciations  of  the  master,  his  charges  against  the 
Southern  statesmen  who  were  plainly  enough  to  their 
associates  determined  to  ruin  the  Union  that  they 
might  rule  an  unmolested  South.  More  than  half 
of  the  four  hours  Sumner  occupied  with  direct  im 
peachment  of  the  character  of  slavery  and  the 
slaveholders,  and  for  the  rest  he  reaffirmed  his  con 
stitutional  position  that  freedom  was  national,  and 
slavery  sectional.  The  speech  made  the  sensation 
that  was  expected,  and  perhaps  it  was  not  strange 
that  the  speaker  looked  for  the  same  treatment  he 
had  received  before.  The  bravado  of  a  wine-party 
and  the  threats  of  one  of  its  members  were  taken 
as  a  definite  plan,  and  Mr.  Sumner  called  upon  the 
Massachusetts  delegation  to  defend  him.  These  gen- 


POLITICAL   CONDITIONS,  I860,  1861.         147 

tlemen  spent  the  night  in  his  room  on  F  Street,  and 
accompanied  him  to  the  Capitol  in  the  morning,  only 
to  find  that  hero  and  guard  alike  were  the  victims  of 
a  drunken  bet  and  a  practical  joke.  But  the  details 
of  that  night's  experience  exhibit  certain  of  Sumner's 
peculiarities.  He  himself  superintended  the  arrange 
ment  of  his  amateur  defenders;  he  suggested  the 
midnight  search  undertaken  by  one  of  his  colleagues, 
with  his  own  private  secretary  as  guide,  to  find  a  Kan 
sas  champion,  then  temporarily  in  the  city,  who  should 
(and  did)  act  as  sentinel  the  rest  of  the  night ;  and 
he  spent  much  time  in  searching  the  classics  for  a  par 
allel  case,  selecting  the  story  of  the  Gracchi,  and  turn 
ing  down  a  leaf  to  mark  the  place. 

This  habit  of  searching  the  classics  for  parallels  to 
his  career  remained  with  him  all  his  life;  he  al 
ludes  to  it  in  correspondence,  makes  use  of  it  in  his 
speeches,  and  comforts  himself  with  it  in  many  crises, 
even  in  his  matrimonial  perplexities.  In  such  trifles 
as  these  we  discover  how  large  a  place  Sumner  seemed 
to  himself  to  occupy,  and  how  important  to  the  na 
tion  he  felt  his  services  to  be ;  and  along  these  lines 
we  find  the  key  to  some  of  his  later  difficulties.  As 
to  whether  such  an  impression  of  his  own  preponder 
ating  value  furnished  a  needed  stimulus  to  the  great 
ambition  which  moved  great  powers,  or  whether  it 
was  the  beam  in  his  eye  which  at  last  prevented 
him  from  doing  his  best  work,  men  will  always 
differ.  Possibly  the  truth  lies  between  the  two 
interpretations. 

Sumner  delivered  another  notable  speech  immedi 
ately  upon  the  adjournment  of  Congress,  at  the  Cooper 


148  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

Union  in  New  York.  It  was  an  early  gun  in  the 
Lincoln  and  Hamlin  campaign ;  and  after  the  fashion 
of  those  days  of  great  issues,  it  dealt  with  principles, 
not  men.  Slavery  was  handled  without  gloves  and  in 
the  same  fashion  as  on  the  floor  of  the  Senate,  and 
the  remedy  was  declared  to  be  in  the  Republican 
party,  pledged  to  its  destruction  and  determined  upon 
it.  It  would  be  superfluous  to  notice  single  speeches 
except  that  Sumner's  work  was  done  in  this  way.  It 
was  his  peculiar  ability  to  persuade  and  convince  the 
nation,  while  his  tragic  history  gave  force  to  his 
words.  This  speech  at  the  Cooper  Union  was  a  great 
power,  and  the  country's  debt  to  him  for  such  ser 
vice,  at  Washington  and  elsewhere,  cannot  easily  be 
measured. 

The  year  ended  with  the  election  of  Lincoln  and 
Hamlin,  and  the  battle  was  drawn.  The  country  had 
determined  that  slavery  should  not  be  extended  with 
out  limit,  and  the  South  took  the  alternative  with 
eagerness.  The  foolish  North  thought  the  contest 
won;  but  the  clear-headed  and  long-looking  South 
knew  it  was  only  begun,  and  her  careful  preparation 
had  at  last  come  to  its  own.  One  of  the  franker 
spirits  among  her  own  orators  openly  declared  that 
the  secession  of  South  Carolina  was  in  no  sense  the 
result  of  Lincoln's  election,  nor  yet  the  result  of 
the  Fugitive  Slave  law;  that  for  thirty  years  the 
South  had  looked  forward  to  this  time,  and  was  now 
determined  upon  its  course,  "  at  whatever  risk."  In 
the  winter  of  1861,  these  preparations  centred  in 
Washington.  The  Secretary  of  War  was  rapidly  send 
ing  ammunition  to  the  South,  the  Secretary  of  the 


POLITICAL   CONDITIONS,   I860,  186L         149 

Navy  obediently  ordering  ships  to  the  farthest  isles  of 
the  sea.  The  President  was  by  turns  bewildered,  ac 
quiescent,  neutral.  In  time  Secretary  Cass  gave  way 
to  Jeremiah  Black,  whose  patriotism  triumphed  over 
lifelong  prejudices,  and  as  the  winter  wore  on  other 
strong  men  came  into  the  Cabinet.  One  of  them 
believed  his  allegiance  to  his  country  greater  than 
that  to  his  President ;  and  Stanton  revealed  plots  in 
the  Cabinet  to  a  committee  of  Congress.  Night  after 
night  he  left  his  communications  at  a  designated  spot, 
whence  they  were  taken  and  acted  upon.  Thus  it 
was  that  Floyd,  confronted  with  his  treason  by  this 
committee  in  the  morning,  was  gone  before  night. 
State  after  state  seceded ;  and  both  Houses  of  Con 
gress  saw  Southern  statesmen  depart  who  had  long 
been  their  leaders,  and  listened  to  the  boasts  and 
threats  which  were  their  farewells.  The  city  itself 
was  a  hot-bed  of  treason.  The  wit  and  social  con 
nections  of  the  women  were  turned  to  account  in 
their  new  business  as  spies.  Army  and  navy  officers 
saw  in  the  near  future  the  cruel  question  of  their  su 
preme  allegiance.  No  man  knew  where  to  step,  lest 
he  crush  through  the  thin  and  trembling  crust  into 
the  volcano  beneath.  All  men  saw  that  a  single 
wrong  move  might  bring  on  the  dreaded  contest ;  for 
it  was  literally  true  that  only  by  single  threads  here 
and  there  was  the  fabric  held  together.  One  wrong 
move  might  tear  the  Union  apart.  It  was  by  reason 
of  no  fictitious  terrors  that  men  like  Grimes  and 
Seward  could  find  no  place  for  consultation  safe  from 
treacherous  eyes,  but  must  meet  at  their  own  back 
doors  under  cover  of  the  night.  As  the  Cabinet 


150  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

changed  from  a  council  of  secession  leaders  to  a 
band  of  active  patriots,  the  city  became  more  and 
more  a  camp,  for  troops  were  hastily  summoned  to 
meet  the  threatened  danger.  The  children  of  those 
days  still  remember  their  nightly  terror  as  they  lis 
tened  to  the  tread  of  the  guards  and  imagined  new 
invasions  ;  but  these  fancied  dangers  grew  every  week 
more  real,  for  in  those  months  Washington  was  almost 
captured  more  than  once. 

Measures  of  all  kinds  were  attempted.  The  fa 
mous  Crittenden  Compromise  was  the  last  effort  to 
compose  the  difficulty  whose  only  solution  was  war. 
The  Peace  Conference  at  Albany  and  the  Peace 
Congress  at  Washington  were  equally  vain.  On  the 
other  hand,  on  both  sides,  men  were  urging  to  im 
mediate  war,  each  side  trusting  to  a  false  estimate  of 
the  weakness  of  the  other ;  and  between  them  stood 
other  men  striving  in  every  way  and  for  many  reasons 
to  put  off  the  contest.  A  recent  brilliant  writer,  him 
self  a  participant  of  the  experiences  of  this  winter, 
has  so  perfectly  described  the  situation  as  to  leave  all 
other  attempts  inadequate.  Says  Mr.  Adams,  — 

"  No  American  then  old  enough  to  participate  in  the 
course  of  events  will  ever  forget  that  winter ;  a  lurid, 
troubled  light  hangs  over  it  in  memory ;  and  so  great 
was  the  tension  that  when  at  last  the  inevitable  oc 
curred,  and  the  war-cloud  burst,  the  sense  of  relief 
throughout  the  country  was  universal.  At  least  the 
period  of  sickening  suspense  had  come  to  an  end.  Be 
tween  the  election  in  November  and  the  inauguration  in 
March,  the  one  question  of  practical  politics  before  the 
country  was  the  transfer  of  the  machinery  of  the  govern- 


POLITICAL   CONDITIONS,   I860,  1S61.         151 

ment  from  the  hands,  either  imbecile  or  untrustworthy,  in 
which  it  then  was,  to  the  hands  of  the  new  men  chosen 
to  take  possession  of  it.  It  was  the  most  critical  period 
through  which  the  government  of  the  United  States  was 
called  upon  to  pass,  —  a  crisis  protracted  through  months. 
.  .  .  Had  the  Southern  extremist  prevailed,  and  the 
Southern  blood  been  fired  by  an  assault  on  Fort  Sum- 
ter  in  January,  the  slave  States  would  probably  have 
been  swept  into  a  general  insurrection  while  Buchanan 
was  still  President,  with  Floyd  as  his  Secretary  of  War. 
Had  this  occurred,  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  the  Union 
could  have  been  preserved." 

He  goes  on  to  say,  in  a  passage  so  fine  it  is  diffi 
cult  to  omit  quoting  it,  that  while  for  the  South  the 
true  policy  was  haste,  for  the  North  the  only  policy 
was  delay  until  the  4th  of  March  should  see  the 
government  in  safer  hands.  And  for  the  sake  of  this 
delay,  it  was  statesmanship  as  well  as  policy  to  dis 
cuss  over  and  over  again  every  possible  and  impossi 
ble  compromise.  This  which  now  seems  to  have 
been  the  only  motive  of  the  compromisers  of  1860 
was  indeed  a  large  cause  of  their  action ;  but  their 
first  and  primary  desire  was  some  kind  of  settlement 
which  should  avoid  war  and  preserve  the  Union,  and 
the  way  to  do  this  appeared  to  be  now  in  one  direc 
tion  and  now  in  another.  Mr.  Charles  Francis  Adams 
offered  a  proposition  to  amend  the  Constitution,  for 
ever  prohibiting  interference  with  slavery ;  but  scarcely 
was  that  rejected  before  he  himself  was  of  quite  a 
different  mind,  and  the  country  was  of  the  same  un 
certain  temper.  Alarmed  at  the  result  of  its  own 
action,  still  clinging  to  its  business  interests  before  all 
things  else,  with  the  popular  majority  against  the  new 


152  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

President,  and  the  border  states  hanging  in  the  bal 
ance,  delay  was  indeed  the  true  policy,  whether  medi 
tated  or  not ;  and  for  the  same  reason  the  Southern 
leaders  were  in  hot  haste.  But  with  Dix  and  Holt 
and  Stanton,  and  later  Jere.  Black,  in  that  Cabinet 
which  Floyd  and  Thompson  had  manipulated  for  the 
Confederacy,  the  Union  was  saved.  Unquestionably 
we  owe  the  nation  to  that  brave  and  determined 
group  of  men  who  were  ready  to  do  anything,  to  dare 
all  things,  to  sacrifice  more  than  life  if  need  be,  for 
their  country. 

Sumner,  to  whom  slavery  had  become  the  only 
point  of  consideration,  and  who  never  considered 
methods  of  working,  was  in  no  mood  for  delay.  To 
him  it  was  always  true  that  "  in  God's  war,  slackness 
is  infamy."  He  spared  no  words  to  urge  the  North 
to  immediate  war.  "  The  sacred  animosity  between 
Freedom  and  Slavery,"  said  he,  "  can  only  end  in  the 
triumph  of  Freedom."  And  he  was  hurt  and  angry  at 
what  seemed  to  him  the  supine  delay  and  temporizing 
policy  of  Seward  and  the  leaders  associated  with  him, 
and  the  criminal  apathy  of  the  bulk  of  the  North. 
Then,  as  always,  the  two  men  stood  for  opposite  prin 
ciples  of  action.  Sumner  would  have  the  whole  or 
nothing ;  Seward  thought  half  the  loaf  better  than 
starvation.  Sumner  believed  that  you  could  accom 
plish,  by  the  mere  force  of  decreeing  it,  that  which 
ought  to  be,  and  he  translated  duty  and  the  ideal 
alike  by  his  own  understanding  of  those  terms ;  Sew 
ard  believed  that  a  leader  could  go  no  farther  than 
the  people  were  ready  to  follow  him,  and  you  could 
reach  the  ideal  only  by  slow  steps ;  and  sometimes  he 


SUMNER   AND  SEWARD.  153 

translated  duty  by  the  public  wish.  Obviously,  neither 
was  quite  right  nor  altogether  wrong.  What  Sumner 
longed  for  and  could  not  bring  about,  Seward  carried 
forward  to  success ;  what  Seward  planned  to  bring  about 
with  wide  and  far-reaching  insight  and  purpose,  Sum 
ner  persuaded  the  country  to  believe  in  and  support. 
They  were  the  right  and  left  hands  of  national  pro 
gress.  The  wiser  Seward  understood  this,  and  valued 
Sumner  accordingly;  but  Sumner  only  occasionally 
appreciated  Seward.  His  incapacity  to  understand 
less  direct  natures  than  his  own,  his  impatience  at 
contradiction,  his  conviction  of  the  importance  of  the 
issue,  all  impelled  him  to  sharp  criticism,  —  an  im 
pulse  he  never  failed  to  gratify ;  but  long  association 
taught  Seward  to  understand  Sumner,  and  his  tact  was 
always  equal  to  the  situation.  Neither  yielding  nor 
replying,  he  pressed  on  his  course. 


154  CHARLES  SUMNER. 


CHAPTER   XIV. 
1861,  1862. 

BEGINNING    OF   WAR. WORK    OF    CONGRESS. SUMNER 

AND  THE  ADMINISTRATION. SPEECH  ON  THE  "TRENT" 

AFFAIR. 

AND  so  the  nation  forged  on  its  troubled  way.  The 
struggle  in  Charleston  Harbor  and  the  fall  of  Sumter 
was  a  rude  awakening  to  the  great  mass  of  the  people 
on  both  sides.  The  strife  was  begun  weeks  before 
Alexandria  or  Baltimore  saw  any  shedding  of  blood ; 
but  the  country  would  not  believe  it.  As  when  one 
awakes  out  of  troubled  sleep,  all  things  are  in  a  maze 
and  confusion,  so  there  was  no  clear  vision  anywhere, 
but  distrust,  distress,  dismay.  Lincoln  came  to  Wash 
ington,  an  ill-disguised  disappointment  to  the  Northern 
congressmen,  who  neither  trusted  nor  admired  him, 
and  in  that  hour  of  folly  set  Seward  far  above  him. 
The  inauguration  of  1861  saw  the  beginning  of  war  in 
the  midst  of  a  legislative  situation  without  precedent 
in  any  history,  perplexing  beyond  the  mind  of  man  to 
conceive,  and  difficult  to  tread  as  a  labyrinth.  Much 
is  said  of  the  debt  we  owe  our  soldiers,  and  we  may 
well  pay  them  all  honour ;  but  the  debt  we  owe  our 
legislators  of  that  time  has  been  too  much  forgotten. 
Theirs  was  the  more  difficult  task.  Upon  Congress 


WORK  OF  CONGRESS.  155 

was  laid  the  duty  of  governing  a  nation  on  the  old 
principles  under  conditions  so  new  that  the  two 
could  scarcely  be  made  to  coincide ;  it  must  proceed 
on  its  own  theory  that  the  nation  was  still  a  unit,  while 
in  fact  it  waged  war  upon  half  the  body  politic.  It 
was  the  task  of  Congress  so  to  preserve  the  Union 
that  the  nation  might  be  re-created  out  of  its  broken 
fragments ;  to  discover  a  new  interpretation  of  a 
constitution  that  all  statesmen  had  read  in  one 
fashion  from  the  beginning;  to  find  fresh  readings 
which  should  meet  exigencies  undreamed  of  by  any 
philosopher  of  any  nation.  Upon  their  shoulders  lay 
the  burden  of  democracy  itself,  for  if  they  failed,  the 
rule  of  the  people  was  dead  without  resurrection. 
They  must  prove  that  power  was  not  despotism,  but 
that  patriotism  could  rule  as  surely  as  a  king;  and 
they  must  do  it  by  means  of  the  fluctuating  will  of  a 
people  torn  with  anxiety  and  fear.  All  this  lay  under 
and  behind  their  action,  but  it  was  their  immediate 
duty,  amid  a  daily  routine  enormously  increased,  to 
wage  war  with  undrilled  men,  to  conquer  a  fierce  foe 
that  had  prepared  itself  long  and  with  exceptional 
forecast.  They  had  neither  men  nor  money  nor 
power;  they  had  first  to  find  authority  and  then  to 
secure  all  things.  Behind  them  was  a  people  unpre 
pared,  ignorant  of  the  necessity  to  a  degree,  and  by 
turns  fiercely  patriotic,  and  reluctant  for  the  burdens 
laid  upon  them.  Day  by  day  problems  arose  on 
which  turned  questions  of  life  and  death,  and  there 
was  divided  counsel  as  to  the  way  of  wisdom.  On 
the  question  of  the  blockade  turned  our  whole  foreign 
relations ;  on  the  exchange  of  prisoners  or  the  eman- 


156  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

cipation  of  the  negro,  the  right  to  wage  the  war  at 
all ;  on  the  power  to  tax  the  people,  the  whole  rela 
tion  of  the  citizen  to  the  government.  The  lightest 
action  of  these  men  must  be  based  on  the  principles 
underlying  our  government.  Nothing  was  superficial 
or  trifling.  Nor  was  the  Congress  a  unit  in  its  pur 
pose  or  its  plan.  Strongly  and  sternly  determined 
that  the  old  flag  should  conquer,  they  were  of  many 
minds  as  to  the  methods  of  the  warfare.  Ambition 
was  not  dead,  but  found  new  food.  Old  enmities 
still  caused  division  •  and,  above  all,  there  were  traitors 
in  the  camp,  —  men  who  hardly  concealed  their  desire 
for  Southern  success.  Even  the  ranks  of  the  faithful 
were  altogether  divided  in  counsel ;  while  the  fierce 
Abolitionist  always  felt  that  the  main  point  to  gain 
was  emancipation,  the  man  of  compromise  could  not 
forget  the  Union  he  loved  better  than  anything  else. 
As  months  lengthened  into  years,  and  men  grew 
wonted  to  the  excitements  of  war,  personal  feeling 
crept  in.  The  chief  concern  of  this  representative 
was  to  promote  the  fortunes  of  some  incompetent 
general ;  that  senator  was  angry  at  the  treatment  of 
a  Cabinet  officer,  and  sulked  in  his  seat.  And  in  a 
time  that  tried  men's  souls,  evil  was  not  wanting,  — 
there  were  bad  men  in  the  government,  though 
strangely  few  and  far  between.  Burdens  beyond  the 
telling,  anxieties  beyond  measure,  beset  the  Congress 
of  those  five  years.  Hard  work,  often  tedious  and 
still  more  often  unnoticed,  was  its  lot ;  but  in  the  fierce 
light  that  beset  the  leaders,  or  in  the  rank  and  file  of 
the  great  body,  these  men  did  their  difficult  duty,  and 
did  it  well.  Let  the  issue  mete  to  them  their  due 


WORK  OF  CONGRESS.  157 

praise.  None  the  less  than  our  armies  did  they  fight 
for  us ;  none  the  less  do  we  owe  them  gratitude  and 
undying  honour. 

It  is  with  this  most  important  phase  of  our  Civil 
War  —  as  has  been  said,  too  often  forgotten  or  neg 
lected  for  the  more  showy  victories  of  the  battlefield 
—  that  Sumner  had  to  do,  although  for  a  moment 
he  turned  away  from  it,  with  a  brief  dream  of  the 
English  mission  happily  unfulfilled.  The  history  of 
the  war  divides  itself  into  three  periods  not  sharply 
and  distinctly,  much  less  locally,  distinguished.  There 
was  the  first  onset,  when  both  sides  rushed  to  the 
contest,  even  in  the  midst  of  varying  fortunes  sure 
of  an  easy  victory;  there  was  the  slough  of  de 
spond  into  which  both  of  them  fell  one  after  the 
other,  as  they  discovered  it  was  to  be  a  war,  not  a 
fight ;  and  there  was  the  coming  of  the  end,  when  it 
was  plain  to  see  what  the  end  would  be,  but  it  was 
still  a  long  and  uncertain  and  dreadful  passage  unto 
it.  In  each  period,  peculiarly  delicate  and  difficult 
and  important  questions  came  before  Congress,  and 
Sumner  had  a  large  share  in  their  solution ;  but  his 
role  was  always  the  same.  It  was  his  part  to  discover 
constitutional  authority  and  legal  or  political  prece 
dent,  and  his  mission  to  keep  the  popular  heart  fired 
with  such  enthusiasm  as  would  furnish  a  strong  sup 
port  to  the  government.  "What  does  Mr.  Sumner 
think?  What  will  Mr.  Lincoln  do?"  was  the  signifi 
cant  form  of  public  speech. 

How  little  the  Senator  sometimes  understood  the 
complicated  situation,  and  how  thoroughly  he  believed 
anything  possible  at  any  time  that  seemed  to  him  right, 


158  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

appeared  at  once.  The  war  was  hardly  begun,  before 
in  July  he  followed  our  defeat  at  Bull  Run  by  a  bill 
for  confiscating  the  property  of  the  rebels ;  and  in 
October,  at  a  state  convention  in  Massachusetts,  he 
made  a  strong  speech  for  immediate  and  complete 
emancipation.  Neither  practical  nor  legal  difficulties 
appalled  him.  We  were  far  enough  from  dictating 
terms  in  those  days.  Defeated,  discouraged,  disap 
pointed,  we  were  but  learning  the  art  of  war,  and 
through  much  tribulation  struggling  along  the  road  to 
freedom ;  but  Sumner  would  have  us  issue  proclama 
tions  of  liberty,  nor  did  the  intricate  constitutional 
relations  of  such  propositions  trouble  him  at  all,  —  he 
was  used  to  discovering  unthought-of  powers  in  the 
Constitution,  —  and  the  difficulty  of  carrying  out  a 
measure  was  to  him  a  sort  of  proof  of  its  necessity. 
He  was  moreover  blind  to  the  immediate  effect  on 
the  people  of  such  a  course  at  that  time.  Sumner  is 
often  called  a  statesman  above  his  fellows,  because  he 
insisted  on  some  measure  of  high  principle  long  before 
his  associates  adopted  it.  It  is  said  that  in  the  end  the 
others  came  to  his  position,  and  thus  his  political  wis 
dom  was  vindicated.  This  is  but  juggling  with  words. 
In  this  —  one  of  his  greatest  qualities  —  Sumner  was 
the  prophet,  but  not  the  statesman.  By  this  very  token 
he  was  not  as  wise  for  counsel  as  his  fellows.  What 
he  hoped  for,  he  believed  possible,  and  he  never 
knew  whether  the  time  was  ripe  for  action.  The 
statesman  sees  both  the  deed  and  the  hour.  Sumner 
could  see  only  the  necessity  for  the  deed;  but  by 
much  reiteration  of  its  possibility  and  its  necessity,  he 
largely  brought  on  the  hour  of  its  accomplishment. 


BEGINNING  OF  WAR.  159 

But,  meanwhile,  so  blind  was  he  to  present  conditions 
that  in  the  particular  case  of  emancipation  he  be 
lieved  it  the  only  way  to  prevent  foreign  intervention. 
Unconscious  of  the  power  of  the  cotton  interests,  he 
imagined  the  anti- slavery  England  he  knew,  to  be  the 
whole  of  Britain,  and  thought  to  hinder  its  sympathy 
for  the  South  by  a  blow  at  the  very  foundations  of 
the  cotton  system. 

As  the  months  of  1861  and  1862  wore  away,  they 
brought  with  them  more  and  more  of  the  horrors  of 
war,  and  a  clearer  insight  for  both  sides  into  the  tre 
mendous  undertaking.  Lincoln  called  around  him  a 
Cabinet  of  statesmen ;  and  looking  back  upon  them, 
each  in  turn  seems  so  great  that  he  fills  the  whole 
picture.  What  shall  be  said  of  Seward,  whose  brain 
was  pitted  against  all  Europe,  and  always  won  ?  Who 
shall  measure  the  ability  of  Chase,  or  the  patriotism 
of  Montgomery  Blair,  ablest  member  of  an  able 
family?  And  though  the  historian  of  the  future  add 
blunder  to  blunder,  he  cannot  hide  the  fact  that  we 
owe  the  nation  to  Stanton.  There  were  giants  in 
those  days,  and  among  them  Sumner  walked  with 
equal  step.  The  war  went  on,  but  in  no  sense  con 
verged  toward  a  crisis ;  the  rather  it  dragged  on  as  if 
there  was  no  end.  Defeat  at  Bull  Run  and  Ball's  Bluff 
was  succeeded  by  victory  under  Grant  and  Butler  and 
Foote  and  Farragut  and  Porter  in  the  west  and 
along  the  Mississippi ;  but  the  "  Alabama  "  was  still 
scouring  the  seas,  and  the  "  Merrimac  "  was  still  afloat, 
even  if  temporarily  driven  back.  The  Army  of  the 
Potomac  under  McClellan  gained  the  unavailing  vic 
tory  of  Williamsburg,  it  is  true ;  but  it  halted  before 


160  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

Richmond,  retreated  before  Lee  and  Stonewall  Jack 
son,  and  squandered  time  and  heroes  and  public 
patience  in  the  Peninsula.  The  fortunes  of  war  fluc 
tuated  between  the  two  armies ;  on  both  sides  every 
victory  was  followed  by  a  defeat,  and  every  repulse 
in  one  quarter  met  by  success  in  some  other.  Every 
where  some  South  Mountain  was  the  twin  of  each 
Antietam.  We  discovered  in  those  first  years  that 
this  was  war,  and  the  knowledge  filled  us  with  gloom 
and  dismay. 

The  relations  between  Sumner  and  the  administra 
tion  were  most  curious  and  by  no  means  uniform. 
With  both  Lincoln  and  Seward  he  was  personally  on 
friendly  or  intimate  terms,  but  publicly  they  were  at 
constant,  sometimes  bitter,  variance.  With  Chase, 
representing  the  more  radical  anti-slavery  element  in 
the  Cabinet,  Sumner  was  on  equally  familiar  terms  of 
private  friendship,  and  in  exact  proportion  to  his 
differences  with  Seward,  in  full  public  accord.  Now 
more  than  ever  Sumner  showed  what  some  one  has 
called  his  "  capacity  for  loving  the  absolute  right  ab 
stracted  from  its  practical  use."  The  old  Puritan 
blood  in  him  asserted  itself,  and  with  power  in  our 
own  hands,  he  deemed  it  criminal  as  well  as  weak  not 
to  compel  the  end  desired.  He  did  not  stop  to  con 
sider  whether  we  possessed  anything  more  than  the 
semblance  of  power,  and  he  would  not  take  into  ac 
count  the  conservative  necessities  of  responsibility. 
The  process  of  educating  and  representing  a  whole 
people,  and  so  ruling  them,  was  abhorrent  to  him.  He 
believed,  as  all  his  ancestors  had  done,  that  only  his 
own  faction  could  be  right,  and  he  followed  that  most 


SUMMER  A  AW    THE   ADMINISTRATION.      161 

specious  of  false  maxims  in  national  morals,  —  that  the 
right  was  always  the  shortest  line  between  the  two 
points.  These  sentiments  he  did  not  hesitate  to  ex 
press  in  public  and  private.  The  recently  published 
life  of  Dana  reports  Sumner  as  not  only  denouncing 
Seward  in  the  bitterest  terms,  but  even  seeking  to 
undermine  the  Secretary  of  State  among  foreign  min 
isters  and  in  correspondence  with  European  states 
men.  Certainly  with  others  of  his  fellow- radicals  he 
did  not  hesitate  to  proclaim  the  vacillation  and  tim 
idity  of  the  administration  on  every  public  occasion ; 
and  in  this  he  was  privately  aided  and  abetted  by 
Chase,  already  scheming  for  the  presidency.  In  the 
household  of  Mr.  Seward,  Sumner  was  on  the  intimate 
terms  of  old  friendship,  and  his  personal  relations 
with  the  President  were  of  much  the  same  nature  as 
with  the  Secretary,  —  friendly  and  sometimes  inti 
mate.  At  the  White  House  he  was  always  a  welcome 
visitor,  and  between  him  and  Mrs.  Lincoln  there 
sprang  up  a  close  friendship,  —  an  alliance  offensive 
and  defensive  against  Seward,  it  was  sometimes  said. 
Sumner  found  in  Mrs.  Lincoln  a  cultivated  and 
agreeable  companion,  and  he  was  known  to  say  that 
she  was  the  most  brilliant  woman  of  his  acquaint 
ance,  and  one  who  could  carry  on  conversation  in 
three  different  languages.  They  themselves  espe 
cially  enjoyed  conversing  and  even  corresponding  in 
French. 

But  while  Lincoln  and  Seward  and  Sumner  all 
three  valued  these  close  relations  and  fostered  them 
for  public  as  well  as  personal  reasons,  their  political 
relations  were  of  a  different  character,  —  a  difference 


162  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

whose  cause  has  already  been  explained.  Sumner 
could  not  understand  Lincoln,  and  for  a  long  time 
did  not  believe  in  him.  This  did  not  prevent  him 
from  constant  and  reiterated  advice,  given  with  a  posi- 
tiveness  and  vehemence  which  amounted  to  direc 
tion.  Lincoln  not  only  listened  to  this  advice,  but 
often  sought  it,  and  found  it  of  the  greatest  value. 
It  represented  that  moral  sentiment  in  respect  to 
slavery  which  he  wished  to  regard,  although  too  wise 
to  follow  its  methods.  Moreover,  by  frequent  consul 
tation  with  Sumner,  Lincoln  kept  himself  in  general 
accord  with  the  advanced  anti- slavery  sentiment,  in  a 
time  when  he  needed  the  united  support  of  all  fac 
tions,  and  thus  held  to  the  administration  that  great 
body  of  Northern  Republicans  who  regulated  their 
politics  by  Sumner's  opinions. 

With  Seward  as  Secretary  of  State,  Sumner  imme 
diately  came  into  official  relations.  The  opening  of  the 
Thirty-sixth  Congress  saw  the  Senator  placed  at  the 
head  of  the  Senate  Committee  on  Foreign  Relations, 
—  a  just  and  fortunate  recognition  of  his  knowledge  of 
its  duties  and  his  foreign  influence.  This  made  him 
the  congressional  mouthpiece  of  the  administration 
in  all  matters  relative  to  our  most  important  and  deli 
cate  relations  with  other  nations,  and  brought  him 
into  constant  and  confidential  communication  with 
his  long-time  associate.  Seward,  as  had  been  true  so 
long,  understood  very  well  how  to  manage  Sumner's 
somewhat  difficult  temperament.  Ignoring  his  public 
criticisms  of  the  government,  the  diplomatic  Secretary 
would  listen  quietly  as  the  Senator  declared  he  could 
not,  he  would  not,  support  some  measure  determined 


SUMNER  AND    THE  ADMINISTRATION.       163 

upon,  and  then,  apparently  for  the  moment  setting 
aside  the  direct  point  at  issue,  would  suggest  a  private 
letter  from  Sumner  to  some  foreign  diplomat  —  his 
friend  —  which  should  materially  aid  the  matter. 
Sumner,  as  anxious  as  Seward  or  Lincoln  for  the  suc 
cess  of  the  whole  cause,  would  forthwith  write  the 
letter,  and  in  the  excitement  of  diplomacy  accept  the 
position.  It  is  quite  true  that  in  such  fashion,  and 
of  necessity,  was  this  great  man  turned  about  by  the 
tact  of  his  associates.  In  matters  of  administration 
he  was  a  child,  but  he  imagined  himself  as  strong  in 
executive  ability  as  elsewhere.  Therefore  it  was  that 
for  the  country's  sake  it  was  necessary  to  bring  about 
his  acquiescence  in  methods  too  slow  and  too  circui 
tous  for  his  pleasure ;  and  this  both  Seward  and  Lin 
coln  knew  how  to  do.  They  understood  him  too,  — 
no  small  matter,  —  and  interpreted  his  fiery  denunci 
ation  by  their  knowledge  of  his  real  attitude  rather 
than  by  the  face  of  his  words,  —  a  course  which  men 
who  came  after  them  could  not  or  would  not  take. 

In  the  early  days  of  Lincoln's  administration  we 
reached  one  of  the  many  great  crises  through  which 
we  were  constantly  passing.  When  Seward  was  once 
asked  what  he  considered  the  darkest  period  of  the 
war,  he  replied  that  it  was  the  time  between  his  send 
ing  the  memorandum  on  the  "Trent "  affair  and  Earl 
Russell's  answer.  This  was  the  unique  occasion  on 
which  Sumner  took  the  conservative  position,  when 
perhaps  he  saved  us  from  a  direr  disaster  than  we 
imagined.  It  is  necessary  to  recall  only  the  main 
points  of  so  famous  an  episode.  In  October,  1861, 
James  M.  Mason  and  John  Slidell,  duly  accredited 


1 64  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

agents  of  the  Confederacy,  and  carrying  credentials 
and  despatches  to  foreign  governments,  took  passage 
for  Liverpool,  at  Havana,  in  an  English  ship,  the 
"  Trent."  Captain  Wilkes,  the  brave  commander  of 
one  of  our  war  ships,  overhauled  the  "  Trent,"  and  took 
possession  of  these  commissioners,  bringing  them 
back  to  the  United  States  as  prisoners- of-war.  The 
country  broke  out  in  one  chorus  of  praise.  The 
Secretary  of  the  Navy  publicly  complimented  Captain 
Wilkes,  and  the  House  of  Representatives  tendered 
him  the  thanks  of  Congress ;  but  if  the  first  impulse 
was  deliriously  triumphant,  the  second  thought  was 
indeed  sober.  England,  enraged  at  the  practical  ap 
plication  of  her  own  theory  of  international  law,  de 
manded  the  release  of  Mason  and  Slidell,  accom 
panying  the  demand  with  unmistakable  suggestions 
of  war.  Our  own  people,  e*xcited  and  exasperated 
beyond  endurance,  and  careless  of  our  desperate 
situation,  cried  out  eagerly  for  fighting.  The  legal 
question  involved,  although  somewhat  complicated 
from  the  British  point  of  view,  was  clear  enough 
from  ours.  We  had  transgressed  our  own  prece 
dents,  and  done  that  thing  which  we  had  so  long 
complained  of  Great  Britain  for  doing.  We  had 
made  a  mistake,  and  must  say  so.  But  would  the 
country  stand  such  a  course;  would  it  endure  the 
humiliation?  On  the  other  hand,  Great  Britain  had 
more  than  a  pretext  for  war,  and  could  we  prevent 
her  seizing  upon  it,  eager  as  most  of  her  people  were 
for  recognition  of  the  Southern  Confederacy?  Mr. 
Seward  was  right  in  saying  that  no  darker  hour 
came  to  us  than  the  time  when  England's  course 


SPEECH  ON  THE   "  TRENT"  AFFAIR.       165 

was  still  uncertain.     The  statesmanlike  insight,  dip 
lomatic  skill,  and  cool  judgment  in  which  Seward, 
Adams,  and   Lincoln   shared    equally,  were   no  less 
valuable  to  us  than  the  really  heroic  courage  with 
which,  between  an  excited  people  and  an  enraged 
enemy,  they  could  both  stand  firm  and  retreat.     The 
service  that  Sumner  rendered  was  even  more  neces 
sary  and  difficult ;    he  quieted  and  satisfied  our  own 
people,  and  brought  them  to  the  support  of  the  gov 
ernment  in  its  high  and  difficult  duty  of  "backing 
down  "  from  its  own  position.     No  matter  how  much 
policy  there  may  have  been  in  the  necessity  to  escape 
a  war  with  England,  there  was  no  more  splendid  ex 
hibition  of  the  moral  strength  of  a  popular  government 
during  the  whole  war  than  in  the  acquiescence  of  the 
North  to  the  judgment  of  the  government,  and  its 
confidence  in  the  patriotism  that  yet  moved  so  mys 
teriously  to  their  view;    and  this  result  was  due  as 
much  to  their  personal  confidence  in  Sumner  as  to 
any  other  one  thing.     Himself  sympathizing  strongly 
with  the  American  feeling  that  Captain  Wilkes  had 
won  a  great  triumph,  he  was  at  first  desirous  of  up 
holding  him ;   but  whether  through  the  influence  of 
Seward  and  Lincoln,  or  by  reason  of  his  own  research, 
or  because  much  of  the  responsibility  lay  with  him, 
and  he  was  never  so  rash  in  action  as  in  speech,  he 
speedily  saw  that  this  position  was  untenable,  and  set 
himself  to  make  the  country  see  it  also.     And  such 
was  their  confidence  in  his  learning,  his  uncompro 
mising  patriotism,  his  devotion  to  principle,  that  the 
people  trusted  his  judgment  and  rested  on  his  au 
thority.      Sullenly,   and  with  much  grumbling,   and 


1 66  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

often  with  violent  expression  of  dissent,  they  followed 
his  lead  ;  but  follow  it  they  did.     If  in  those  days  the 
ship  of  state  was  neither  wrecked  on  the  British  rock 
nor  foundered  in  the  American  whirlpool,  it  was  due 
in  great  measure  to  Charles  Sumner.    The  great  speech 
in  which  he  set  forth  our  position  is  too  close  an  argu 
ment  for  brief  quotation ;  but  it  was  specially  remark 
able  for  two  things,  —  its  clear  explanation  of  the  fact 
that  we  could  not  hold  the  position  we  had  taken,  and 
must  by  our  own  precedents  retreat ;  and  its  strong 
assertion  of  the  absolute  Americanism  of  such  a  re 
treat.     We  must  give  up  to  England  indeed,  but  we 
gave  up  because  it  was  the  only  course  possible  to 
American  principles.    We  allowed  England  her  claim  ; 
but  thereby  we  obliged  her  to  destroy  generations  of 
her  own  precedents,  and  to  acknowledge  the  wrong 
doing  of  years.      We  gave  up  the  case  in  hand,  to 
establish  our  whole  position ;    and  boldly  we  carried 
the  war  into  Africa  by  the  implication  that,  harassed 
as  we  were,  we  were  still  strong  enough  to  forego  our 
present  advantage  for  the  sake  of  justifying  our  past 
and  preparing  for  a  future  whose  coming  we  never 
doubted.     The  splendid  boldness  of  such  a  position 
is  evident  to-day,  but  in  that  excited  hour  the  sur 
render  of  our  prisoners  and  our  pride  was  a  great 
price  to  pay,  and  it  needed  all  Sumner's  eloquence 
to  make  it  palatable.     And  for  that  large  and  influen 
tial  element  who  saw  that  we  must  give  up  the  men, 
but  needed  some  justification,  Sumner  again  performed 
the  same  service  he  had  done  at  the  beginning  in  the 
question  of  slavery  and  the  Constitution,  —  he  made 
plain  the  legal  and  constitutional  necessity  of  the  gov- 


SPEECH  ON  THE  "  TRENT"  AFFAIR.      167 

ernment's  position.  It  is  abundant  evidence  of  the 
strength  of  his  influence  that  he  satisfied  both  radical 
and  conservative,  and  it  was  equally  a  tribute  to  the 
general  confidence  in  his  moral  integrity  that  there 
was  so  little  talk  of  English  influence.  Indeed,  it  is 
no  less  an  illustration  of  his  moral  power  that  he  took 
the  position  he  did,  and,  always  so  tender  of  England 
as  he  was,  once  and  again  withstood  her  to  her  face. 
"  The  statesman,"  writes  that  philosopher  among 
critics,  Edwin  P.  Whipple,  "  is  not  so  much  inter 
ested  in  the  devices  by  which  men  may  be  influenced, 
as  about  how  they  ought  to  be  influenced;  not  so 
much  about  how  men's  passions  and  prejudices  may 
be  utilized  for  a  momentary  advantage  to  himself  or 
his  party,  as  about  how  they  may  be  hindered  from 
doing  a  permanent  harm  to  the  Commonwealth." 


1 68  CHARLES  SUMNER. 


CHAPTER   XV. 

1862,  1863. 

FOREIGN   AFFAIRS. ANTI-SLAVERY    LEGISLATION.  —  THE 

SENATE. DISTRUST   OF   SEWARD. THIRD    ELECTION 

TO   SENATE. 

THE  year  1862  saw  other  important  but  less  con 
spicuous  service  performed  by  Sumner  in  the  foreign 
affairs  of  his  country.  We  proceeded  to  recognize 
the  governments  of  Hayti  and  Liberia,  —  governments 
that  for  more  than  a  score  of  years  had  knocked  at 
our  doors  in  vain,  because  the  hand  that  knocked  was 
a  black  hand.  Although  we  were  in  the  very  thick 
of  a  war  for  equal  rights,  this  practical  application  of 
our  doctrines  did  not  meet  with  universal  favour,  but 
required  all  Sumner's  skill  and  power  to  lead  us  along 
the  path  Lincoln  marked  out.  Other  important  ques 
tions  arose  over  our  relation  to  Mexico,  Those  were 
the  days  when  the  skilled  and  clever  statesmen  of  the 
Confederacy  had  persuaded  England,  France,  and 
Spain  to  take  counsel  of  their  hopes  and  enter  into 
their  new  and  brief  triple  alliance  for  the  glory 
of  France  and  our  discomfiture,  —  the  days  of  that 
Mexican  house  that  Jack  built,  the  reign  of  the  proud 
and  brave  and  unhappy  Maximilian  and  Carlotta. 
For  the  first  time  since  the  days  of  Madison  we  were 
met  by  one  of  those  complications  so  familiar  to 


ANTI-SLA  VER  Y  LEG  IS  LA  TION.  169 

European  statesmen,  so  long  absent  from  our  annals ; 
but  Lincoln  was  stronger  than  the  Emperor,  Seward 
somewhat  more  than  equal  to  the  great  foreigners 
pitted  against  him.  Congress  had  the  courage  of  its 
convictions.  Full  of  perplexity  as  was  our  own  situa 
tion,  and  dark  as  the  future  might  be,  we  would 
accept  no  foreign  domination,  even  by  indirection. 
Sumner  had  no  doubting  public  to  convince  in  this 
matter.  But  wild  with  patriotism  though  we  were, 
and  ready  to  flaunt  the  Monroe  doctrine  in  the  face 
of  all  the  world  if  we  could  find  the  chance,  we  were 
not  ready  to  pay  for  it !  If  any  illustration  is  needed 
of  the  fact  that  we  were  not  even  then  purged  of  the 
commercial  spirit  that  so  long  refused  to  stand  by  our 
convictions  when  it  cost  anything,  it  may  be  found 
in  the  result  of  Sumner's  efforts  in  this  matter.  In 
his  report  as  chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Foreign 
Relations,  he  recommended  that  we  support  the  Mexi 
can  Republic,  and  advised  that  we  adopt  Seward's 
suggestion  of  pecuniary  aid,  —  a  report  which  was  half 
adopted  and  half  defeated.  The  Senate  and  the 
country  were  ready  to  honour  all  drafts  on  patriotism, 
but  none  on  the  pocket.  We  were  in  favour  of  the 
Republic,  but  we  would  not  give  a  dollar  to  aid  her. 

Meanwhile  the  great  champion  was  not  idle  in  the 
cause  of  the  black  man.  One  step  after  another,  halt 
ingly  or  hurriedly  as  it  might  be,  we  walked  the  path  to 
freedom.  The  question  of  the  relation  of  contrabands 
to  the  army  which  had  liberated  them,  the  abolition 
of  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia,  the  granting 
of  patents  to  coloured  inventors,  the  discrimination 
against  black  men  in  the  postal  service,  the  status  of 


170  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

fugitive  slaves,  the  question  of  competence  of  coloured 
witnesses  in  our  courts,  the  treaty  with  Great  Britain 
which  finally  put  an  end  to  the  slave-trade,  —  a  glance 
at  the  list  shows  how  important  were  the  day-by-day 
subjects  of  discussion,  and  how  we  were  hastening 
on  toward  at  least  an  outward  justice  for  the  negro. 
These  were  the  every-day  affairs  of  Sumner's  life,  -V  the 
legislative  victories  of  a  time  that  had  little  else  of 
cheer.  In  every  direction,  at  this  period,  our  pros 
pects  in  the  field  were  gloomy  beyond  description. 
These  were,  as  the  London  "  Times  "  declared,  "  the 
halcyon  days  of  the  Rebellion."  Our  armies  were  no 
where  permanently  victorious ;  our  people  were  fretful, 
discontented,  and  often  openly  complaining.  Enthu 
siasm  was  gone,  and  duty  had  not  come.  Politics 
were  disturbed  and  disturbing,  but  they  must  be 
reckoned  with  in  the  general  account.  The  out 
look  abroad  added  to  the  general  discouragement. 
French  excitement  was  supported  by  English  deter 
mination,  and  only  Russia  was  our  friend  among  the 
nations.  The  aristocracy  feted  the  Southern  repre 
sentatives  or  guided  governments  for  our  ruin ;  while 
the  people,  sullen  at  the  cotton  famine,  eagerly  sup 
ported  their  leaders.  Only  here  and  there  was  there 
any  light.  The  immense  influence  of  the  Queen  told 
greatly  in  our  behalf,  a  few  noblemen  and  great  com 
moners  pleaded  our  cause,  and  certain  Frenchmen 
of  titles  that  touched  the  throne  lent  the  power  of 
their  presence  to  our  army.  Notwithstanding  these 
bright  points,  a  black  shadow  hung  over  us.  It  was 
easy  to  say  we  could  not  go  on  legislating  toward 
freedom  until  power  was  ours  as  well  as  purpose, 


ANTI-SLA  VER  Y  LEGISLA  TION,  1 ? 1 

but  Sumner  and  those  like-minded  did  not  wait  for 
the  full  dawn.  They  neither  faltered  nor  halted.  By 
one  measure  after  another  they  endeavoured  to  hasten 
on  the  day  of  justice.  Many  of  these  measures  were  pre 
mature  ;  some  were  rash  almost  to  carelessness.  But 
to  attribute  these  defects  to  Sumner  alone  and  the  radi 
cal  nature  of  his  theories,  is  curiously  unfair.  He  was 
never  a  legislator  in  the  strict  sense  of  the  word,  and 
these  bills  so  often  laid  at  his  door  with  censure  or  with 
praise  were  for  the  most  part  the  work  of  other  men. 
It  was  his  colleague  Wilson  who  carried  through  the 
measures  that  gave  freedom  to  the  District  of  Colum 
bia,  and  Dawes  who  wrote  that  first  Emancipation 
Bill.  It  was  Wilson  again,  and  Grimes  of  Iowa,  and 
their  coadjutors  in  the  House,  Lovejoy  and  Patterson, 
who  followed  up  this  law  which  made  the  Washington 
negro  free  by  other  laws  to  educate  him.  If  Sumner 
proposed  with  undue  haste  the  confiscation  of  rebel 
property,  it  was  the  sagacious  Trumbull  who  wrote 
the  bill  for  that  unwise  measure,  and  the  eminently 
practical  Morrill  and  the  clear-minded  Eliot  who 
offered  it  at  the  other  end  of  the  Capitol.  It  was 
Eliot  also  who  equally  with  Sumner  hastened  to  insist 
on  immediate  emancipation  ;  and  it  was  Pomeroy  and 
Ashley  who  would  not  down  till  the  territories  were 
free,  and  who  proposed  to  repeal  the  Fugitive  Slave 
law.  It  may  safely  be  presumed  too  that  Arnold  of 
Illinois,  the  lifelong  friend  of  Lincoln,  was  not  op 
posing  the  real  wish  of  the  administration,  whatever 
may  have  been  its  necessary  and  wise  policy,  when  in 
March,  1862,  he  introduced  a  bill  to  make  freedom 
national.  Sumner  was  often  unwisely  ahead  of  his 


172  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

time,  it  is  true,  but  he  by  no  means  stood  alone. 
Too  radical  a  leader  he  was  indeed,  but  he  was  no 
whit  more  radical  than  many  another  man. 

Around  him  in  the  Senate  in  those  and  slightly  later 
days,  —  sometimes  abreast  of  him,  sometimes  of  a 
more  sober  temper,  —  were  many  strong  men.  Among 
them  was  Fessenden,  compounded  of  keenness  and 
judgment ;  the  strong  and  patriotic  Zachariah  Chand 
ler  and  Hannibal  Hamlin ;  those  undismayed  Abo 
litionists,  Ben.  Wade  and  Samuel  Pomeroy ;  Andrew 
Johnson,  then  a  Democratic  Unionist ;  Timothy  Howe, 
who  in  after  years  witnessed  his  devotion  to  what  he 
believed  the  welfare  of  his  country  by  putting  aside 
for  her  sake  the  Chief- Justiceship ;  old  and  tried 
statesmen  like  John  P.  Hale  and  Collamer  and  Foote  ; 
the  young  but  already  proven  John  Sherman,  and 
many  another  now  long  well  known  to  fame.  Op 
posed  to  them  were  the  second  of  the  Bayard  line, 
and  the  first  Saulsbury,  and  Latham,  and  McDougall, 
and  Thomas  A.  Hendricks  ;  the  pro-slavery  Unionists, 
Garrett  Davis  and  Reverdy  Johnson;  and  the  pro 
nounced  traitors,  Trusten  Polk  and  Clement  C.  Clay. 
The  House  of  Representatives  listened  day  by  day 
through  the  years  that  compassed  the  war  to  a  roll- 
call  of  names  equally  important  to  our  history.  Such 
was  the  quality  of  the  men  who  surrounded  Sumner, 
and  who  called  him  leader  even  when  they  refused 
to  follow. 

In  December,  1862,  the  tact  and  wisdom  of  Lin 
coln  turned  into  an  episode  an  occasion  which  bade 
fair  to  be  a  crisis.  The  deep  discontent  at  the  delays 
and  defeats  of  our  troops  was  constantly  breaking 


DISTRUST  OF  SEWARD  173 

forth.  The  conservatives  felt  that  the  Union  was  no 
nearer  preservation  than  at  first,  and  the  radicals  saw 
no  prospect  of  freedom  for  the  negro.  This  was  in 
deed  the  brunt  of  the  opposition.  The  radicals  had 
already  seen  nearly  two  years  of  Republican  control 
and  bitter  war,  but  the  great  anti-slavery  cause  was 
not  made  the  chief  issue.  The  Union  was  put  before 
the  cause  of  the  negro ;  their  utmost  endeavours  had 
only  succeeded  in  obtaining  from  the  government  a 
provisional  emancipation,  while  it  had  repeatedly  and 
vigorously  refused  to  interfere  in  behalf  of  the  slave, 
sometimes  suppressing  unregulated  efforts  to  free  him. 
Much  of  the  discontent  crystallized  round  the  question 
of  McClellan's  retention  in  command  of  the  army, 
and  its  intensity  on  both  sides  was  greatly  increased 
by  the  political  feeling  entering  into  the  question. 
For  that  officer  in  the  field,  and  Chase,  and  possibly 
Sevvard,  in  the  Cabinet,  already  were  posing  for  the 
succession  to  a  President  whom  none  of  them  were 
yet  ready  to  admire  or  follow. 

Senators  —  always  certain  that  all  real  power  lies 
with  their  own  proud  body  and  that  their  influence 
should  be  decisive  —  entered  fiercely  into  the  contro 
versy  over  the  situation,  and  led  by  the  more  rampant 
Abolition  party,  determined  to  settle  the  matter  for 
the  country's  welfare.  A  caucus  debated  it,  and  a 
committee  carried  out  the  policy.  It  was  one  of 
those  seasons  when  Sumner's  distrust  of  Seward  and, 
shall  we  say,  contempt  of  the  President,  were  at  their 
height,  and  he  was  foremost  in  the  matter.  The  com 
mittee,  of  which  he  was  one,  waited  upon  the  Presi 
dent,  and  actually  demanded  from  him  the  resigna- 


174  CHARLES  SUMNER, 

tion  of  Seward,  —  their  whilom  idol,  but  now  believed 
by  them  all  to  be  the  great  obstacle  to  action.  The 
behaviour  of  Lincoln  before  this  extraordinary  de 
mand  was  consummate  in  its  wisdom  and  skill. 
Without  at  all  sacrificing  his  dignity,  he  brought 
about  a  situation  which  either  compelled  Chase  to 
resign  also  or  enabled  him  to  retain  Seward,  and  the 
discomfited  committee  retired.  Sumner's  share  in 
the  occasion  was  considerable,  although  not  promi 
nent,  and  the  somewhat  ignominious  result  did  not 
improve  his  opinion  of  an  administration  with  so 
little  judgment. 

He  had  other  affairs  to  occupy  him,  however,  of 
much  importance  to  himself.  It  was  six  years  since 
the  assault  in  the  Senate-chamber,  and  the  begin 
ning  of  his  second  term  in  the  Senate.  Just  half  of 
that  term  he  had  spent  in  active  service,  but  those 
three  years  were  of  that  aggressive  sort  which  made 
enemies  as  well  as  friends.  The  autumn  and  winter 
of  1862  and  1863  brought  round  a  fresh  senatorial 
election  in  Massachusetts,  which  was  by  no  means  a 
foregone  conclusion.  The  uncompromising  Aboli 
tionists  of  the  Senate  had  gone  not  one  whit  beyond 
their  adherents  in  the  country  in  their  violent  procla 
mations  of  dissatisfaction,  and  their  vehement  action 
based  upon  it.  For  the  followers  as  well  as  the 
leaders,  Lincoln  was  too  slow  and  Seward  too  cau 
tious.  The  men  who  followed  Ashley  and  Pomeroy 
and  Sumner  considered  this  criminal  neglect,  and 
not  to  be  condoned ;  it  must  be  remedied,  for  the 
sake  of  the  country  and  the  slave  alike ;  and  already 
they  looked  forward  to  substituting  Chase  for  Lincoln. 


THIRD  ELECTION  TO  SENATE.  175 

In  Sumner's  own  commonwealth  there  was  a  wide  di 
vision  of  opinion  along  these  lines,  and,  feeding  upon 
it,  much  scheming  and  counter-scheming  for  his  seat 
in  the  Senate.  The  state  as  a  whole  was  for  Lincoln, 
and  resented  the  avowed  hostility  of  the  Abolition 
leaders.  To  counteract  this  feeling  of  resentment, 
Sumner  entered  readily  into  the  plan  devised  by  his 
intimate  friend  and  colleague  John  B.  Alley,  which 
did  much  toward  his  election.  Mr.  Alley  wrote  for 
Sumner,  and  he  signed  a  letter  to  an  imaginary  cor 
respondent,  which,  appearing  in  a  leading  Boston 
paper,  set  the  Senator  before  his  constituents  as  the 
friend  and  not  the  enemy  of  the  President.  His 
ardent  friends  in  the  state  central  committee  early 
determined  upon  active  efforts  in  his  behalf,  and 
much  skilful  preliminary  work  was  done,  especially  by 
that  friend  of  unfailing  wisdom  and  devotion,  William 
Claflin.  When  the  state  convention  met,  it  proved  to 
be  composed  of  both  the  radical  element,  altogether 
in  sympathy  with  Sumner,  and  the  more  conservative 
division,  of  quite  an  opposite  mind.  That  Massachu 
setts  Warwick,  Frank  W.  Bird,  has  given  an  account 
of  the  contest  which,  although  giving  too  little  credit 
to  other  and  powerful  political  managers,  still  gives 
something  of  the  atmosphere  of  the  fight.  In  a 
long  description  of  the  work  necessary,  Mr.  Bird 
says,  — 

"  A  few  of  us,  knowing  how  desperate  an  effort  was  to 
be  made  to  displace  him,  prepared  early  for  the  contest. 
At  that  time,  as  frequently  before  and  since,  the  leaders 
of  the  Republican  party  may  perhaps  be  said  to  have 
been  against  him,  or  at  least  lukewarm.  We  felt  that  the 


176  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

only  salvation  for  him  was  in  an  appeal  to  the  people. 
Four  of  us  met  together,  and  planned  the  campaign  and 
arranged  the  whole  contest  in  the  state  convention.  The 
contest  came  up  as  we  expected ;  those  who  were  in  it 
will  remember  how  very  sharp  and  bitter  it  was,  led  on 
the  one  hand  by  our  late  friend  Richard  H.  Dana,  Jr.,  — 
a  professed  friend  of  Mr.  Sumner,  and  yet  one  who 
fought  the  battle  that  day  against  him  with  unrivalled 
skill,  —  and  on  the  other  side  by  Mr.  Griffin.  And  the 
result  was  as  we  predicted,  —  that  though  at  first  Mr. 
Dana  evidently  carried  the  convention  with  him,  yet 
when  the  masses  of  the  convention  saw  that  opposition 
to  this  resolution  was  really  hostility  to  Charles  Sumner, 
the  whole  convention  went  over  with  a  whoop,  and  he 
was  nominated." 

And  so  much  breath  did  they  spend  in  glorify 
ing  Sumner  and  Wilson  that  they  had  none  left 
to  mention  Lincoln  or  the  administration  in  their 
resolutions. 

But  the  whole  party  was  by  no  means  of  this  tem 
per.  The  strong  faction  which  Dana  had  led  so  suc 
cessfully  for  a  time  —  in  the  hope,  it  is  said,  that  he 
himself  might  gain  the  coveted  seat  in  the  Senate 
—  was  composed  of  various  divisions.  There  was 
still  a  strong  conservative  element  in  the  Republican 
party,  and  personal  animosities  had  not  altogether 
died  away.  The  faction  that  had  once  ostracized 
Sumner  never  loved  him  ;  aristocrats  of  the  old  India 
wharves  still  hated  the  Abolitionists  of  Faneuil  Hall 
as  much  as  they  loved  the  Union;  other  personal 
quarrels  entered  in ;  and  there  were  the  many  anti- 
slavery  men  of  moderate  ideas  and  reasonable 
demands  who  were  strong  supporters  of  Lincoln. 


THIRD  ELECTION  TO  SENATE.  Itf 

Disappointed  by  the  renomination  of  Sumner,  men 
gathered  from  these  various  sources  started  a  "  peo 
ple's  movement,"  which  nominated  Charles  Francis 
Adams  for  senator,  but  the  movement  was  a  com 
plete  failure.  Mr.  Adams  immediately  withdrew  his 
name.  The  Democrats,  perhaps  emulating  the  first 
coalition,  perhaps  actuated  by  malice,  indorsed  the 
movement;  and  this,  in  the  temper  of  the  public, 
gave  it  a  death-blow.  In  January,  1863,  Sumner  was 
re-elected  by  the  unanimous  vote  of  the  Republicans, 
and  entered  upon  his  third  term  as  senator  just  as 
the  Emancipation  Proclamation  altered  the  whole 
character  of  the  struggle  and  introduced  the  country 
to  a  new  era. 


178  CHARLES  SUMNER. 


CHAPTER   XVI. 
1863. 

EMANCIPATION. 

To  Charles  Sumner  the  Emancipation  Proclamation 
marked  an  epoch ;  it  justified  his  past  and  illumined 
his  future.  Nevertheless,  it  was  not  to  him  altogether 
a  time  of  triumph.  To  be  sure,  he  was  too  much 
a  man  of  one  idea  to  realize  that  the  work  so  well 
begun  was  not  thereby  accomplished.  His  faith  in 
moral  issues  and  his  single  eye  for  their  relation  to 
action  blinded  him  to  the  future  with  its  unavoidable 
delays  and  its  time-serving  policies.  It  was  not 
strange  that  in  the  first  thankfulness  for  the  great 
victory  of  Liberty  he  did  not  dream  of  the  half 
hearted  applications  we  should  afterward  make  of  the 
principles  of  its  great  charter,  Perhaps  the  Barons 
of  Runnymede  did  not  foresee  1688,  and  certainly 
they  did  not  dream  of  the  Stamp  Tax.  So  in  1863 
men  believed  the  battle  won  for  freedom,  —  and  won 
it  was.  The  question  of  the  use  we  should  make  of 
the  victory  belonged  to  a  day  long  in  the  future ;  but 
notwithstanding  all  these  things,  the  victory  was  not 
what  Sumner  had  wished.  He  was  no  more  satisfied 
with  the  Proclamation  when  it  came  than  he  had 
been  satisfied  with  the  delay  in  issuing  it. 


E  MA  NCI  PA  TION:  1 79 

There  were  two  reasons  —  one  depending  on  the 
other  —  why  this  seemed  to  him  but  a  half-hearted 
measure.  It  covered  only  such  parts  of  the  United 
States  as  were  actually  in  open  rebellion,  even  down 
to  particular  counties  in  some  of  the  border  states, 
and  it  was  issued  on  the  ground  of  military  necessity. 
Although  in  1852  Sumner's  great  watchword  was 
"  Freedom  national,  Slavery  sectional,"  in  those  days 
he  interpreted  it  to  mean  the  local  control  of  slavery ; 
but  the  logic  of  events,  as  so  often  happens,  had 
pushed  him  far  beyond  that  interpretation.  And 
while  in  the  day  of  Franklin  Pierce  or  James  Bu 
chanan  he  wished  slavery  left  to  the  control  of  the 
states  and  territories  themselves,  in  the  day  of  Abra 
ham  Lincoln  he  wished  it  controlled  by  the  nation. 
Whether  or  not  he  had  strained  a  point  in  the  first 
interpretation  of  the  Constitution,  it  was  easy  to  see 
the  road  clear  to  his  present  position.  Rebellion  had 
altered  everything.  The  whole  South  was  a  tabula 
rasa,  he  declared ;  and  over  it  as  over  the  territories 
in  1856,  the  nation  had  complete  control,  and  could, 
by  the  old  doctrine  of  Freedom  National,  free  every 
slave  therein.  Looking  back  upon  what  was  then 
the  near  future,  it  is  still  doubtful  whether  Sumner's 
was  not  the  wiser  and  safer  view  of  the  situation ;  but 
it  was  never  the  doctrine  of  Mr.  Lincoln,  who  believed 
in  the  Constitution  more  strongly  than  Sumner  ever 
did,  who  held  in  his  first  inaugural  that  he  was  elected 
to  preserve,  not  re-create,  the  Union,  and  who  declared 
in  his  last  public  utterance  that  he  had  so  preserved  it. 
Nor  was  it  ever  a  doctrine  that  had  the  whole  North 
behind  it.  It  is  not  certain  that  it  could  have  been 


l8o  CHARLES  SUMMER. 

maintained  as  a  matter  of  fact,  whatever  might  have 
been  discovered  as  to  the  constitutional  right.  Plainly 
enough,  however,  these  two  views  opposed  each  other, 
and  could  not  be  reconciled.  In  accordance  with  his 
theory  that  the  Union  still  existed,  Lincoln  freed  the 
slave  only  where  a  military  necessity  required  it,  and 
where  a  state  of  war  gave  him  those  extraordinary 
powers  that  took  no  cognizance  of  constitutions. 
Sumner  would  have  had  him  free  the  slave  by  vir 
tue  of  his  presidential  authority  over  new  territories 
flung  into  the  lap  of  the  nation  by  the  states  as  they 
departed  from  it. 

Thus,  glad  and  grateful  as  Sumner  was  for  the 
Emancipation  Proclamation,  he  saw  too  clearly  the 
logic  of  the  position  under  which  it  was  issued,  and 
the  consequences  which  might  (and  in  fact  did)  flow 
from  such  a  position,  to  be  altogether  satisfied.  In 
truth,  no  old-time  Abolitionist  could  ever  be  satisfied 
with  anything  less  than  the  entire  freedom  of  every 
slave  on  American  soil,  law  or  circumstance  to  the 
contrary  notwithstanding.  From  the  first  days  of  the 
war  Sumner  had  advocated  this  step.  He  always  be 
lieved  that  his  influence  did  much  to  bring  Lincoln 
to  that  point,  —  to  "  screw  old  Abe  up  to  the  sticking- 
point,"  as  he  expressed  it,  —  and  constantly  stated  this 
as  a  fact.  How  much  ground  there  was  for  this  claim 
never  can  be  known,  since  it  was  Lincoln's  habit  to 
allow  other  men  to  dream  that  they  controlled  him. 
"  Don't  I  get  along  well  with  Sumner?"  said  he  one 
day  to  a  colleague  of  that  Senator,  and  with  an  inde 
scribable  twinkle  of  his  mouth ;  "  he  thinks  he  man 
ages  me."  But  it  was  also  the  President's  habit  to 


EMANCIPA  TION.  1 8 1 

listen  to  the  advice  of  all  those  counsellors  whom  he 
trusted,  and  absorbing  something  from  each,  make  up 
his  own  mind  on  the  basis  of  what  they  had  told  him. 
So  while  all  the  world  knows  that  the  Emancipation 
Proclamation  was  written  months  before  any  other 
man  knew  of  its  existence,  it  is  more  than  probable  — 
it  amounts  to  a  certainty  —  that  Sumner,  as  the  leader 
and  representative  of  the  Abolition  movement,  had 
much  influence  upon  the  conception  and  production 
of  the  great  Abolition  edict.  There  is  more  room 
for  doubt  as  to  any  direct  influence  on  either  the 
form  or  the  time. 

Sumner's  first  speech  on  the  subject  was  delivered 
to  a  Massachusetts  Republican  convention,  in  Octo 
ber,  1 86 1.  In  this  speech  he  declared  his  conviction 
that  "  the  overthrow  of  slavery  will  make  end  of  the 
war; "  that  we  had  but  to  do  this,  and  in  a  moment 
"  Rebellion  will  begin  its  bad  luck,  and  the  Union  be 
secure  forever."  We  had  "  but  to  make  "  a  simple 
declaration  that  all  men  within  the  lines  of  the  United 
States  troops  were  free  "  in  strict  conformity  with  the 
Constitution,  and  also  with  precedent;"  but  he  de 
clared  himself  in  favour  of  another  and  higher  author 
ity,  —  "  Martial  law  in  its  plenitude  and  declared  by 
solemn  proclamation."  He  was  moreover  in  favour  at 
that  time  of  the  "bridge  of  gold"  which  was  offered 
by  the  President  in  his  first  proclamation.  A  little 
later,  in  his  Cooper  Union  speech,  he  declared  slavery 
to  be  the  "  origin  and  mainspring  "  of  the  war,  and 
proved  his  case  with  that  unexampled  eloquence  of 
which  he  was  a  master,  and  that  force  and  fire  which 
carried  his  words  straight  to  their  destined  point. 


1 82  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

The  student  may  well  take  this  remarkable  oration  as 
an  epitome  of  the  political  history  of  our  country  in 
relation  to  the  Rebellion.  In  it  Sumner  urged  eman 
cipation  from  every  point  of  view  as  necessary,  in 
evitable,  and  the  certainly  successful  end  of  the  con 
flict.  It  was  said  that  he  could  not  open  his  mouth 
without  talking  of  slavery.  Certainly,  "  all  his  purpose 
lay  face  upward,"  and  at  this  period  he  omitted  no 
opportunity,  suitable  or  unsuitable,  to  urge  emancipa 
tion.  In  the  last  days  of  1 86 1,  he  wrote  thus  to  John 
A.  Andrew,  the  Governor  of  Massachusetts  :  — 

"  We  hope  that  your  message  will  keep  Massachusetts 
ahead,  where  she  has  always  been,  in  the  ideas  of  our 
movement.  Let  the  doctrine  of  Emancipation  be  pro 
claimed  as  an  essential  and  happy  agency  in  subduing  a 
wicked  rebellion.  In  this  way  you  will  help  a  majority 
of  the  Cabinet  whose  opinions  on  this  subject  are  fixed, 
and  precede  the  President  himself  by  a  few  weeks.  He 
tells  me  that  I  am  ahead  of  him  only  a  month  or  six 
weeks." 

Incidentally  this  letter  throws  a  curious  side-light 
on  the  factions  in  the  Cabinet,  and  the  determination 
on  the  part  of  a  certain  party  in  both  Cabinet  and 
Congress,  not  so  much  to  uphold  and  support  the 
President's  policy,  as  to  forestall  it,  to  appear  at  least 
themselves  to  lead,  and  to  force  his  hand. 

The  inability  to  accomplish  this  purpose  through 
the  President,  the  vexation  at  his  delay,  probably  did 
much  to  hasten  the  development  of  Mr.  Sumner's 
views;  for  in  February,  1862,  we  find  that  he  had 
ceased  to  look  to  the  President  for  help,  and  urged 
that  the  matter  was  altogether  in  the  hands  of  Con- 


EMANCIPATION.  183 

gress.  After  that  time  he  no  longer  advocated  eman 
cipation  by  martial  law  and  as  a  military  necessity,  but 
took  the  ground  that  state  rebellion  was  state  suicide, 
and  the  whole  South  had  become  national  territory, 
under  the  constitutional  control  of  Congress.  The 
resolutions  which  he  offered  on  Feb.  n,  1862,  were 
the  first  public  utterance  of  the  views  he  ever  af 
terward  upheld  as  to  our  relations  to  the  rebellious 
states,  and  were  the  foundation  of  all  his  later  policy 
in  regard  to  them.  It  was  on  this  rock  that  he  even 
tually  split  from  his  party  and  most  of  his  associates. 
Whether  the  too  hasty  development  of  his  views 
ever  would  have  come  about  if  he  could  have  per 
suaded  the  President  to  an  earlier  proclamation  of 
emancipation,  it  is  impossible  to  tell;  but  certainly 
it  was  much  hastened  by  the  necessity  he  felt  for  dis 
covering  some  ground  to  get  the  power  away  from  the 
President  and  into  hands  he  thought  wiser  and  more 
truly  patriotic. 

These  resolutions  held  that  the  secession  of  a  state 
and  the  treason  involved  in  it  "  works  instant  forfeit 
ure  of  all  functions  and  powers  essential  to  the  con 
tinued  existence  of  the  State  as  a  body  politic,"  and 
thereby  it  became  at  once  and  completely  national 
territory  \  that  this  "  termination  of  a  State  "  neces 
sarily  caused  the  termination  of  slavery,  which,  not 
being  upheld  by  the  Constitution,  was  only  a  State 
institution ;  that  under  these  circumstances  it  was 
the  "  duty  of  Congress  to  see  that  the  supremacy  of 
the  Constitution  is  maintained  in  its  essential  princi 
ples,  so  that  everywhere  in  this  extensive  territory, 
slavery  shall  cease  to  exist  in  fact,  as  it  has  already 


184  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

ceased  to  exist  in  law  or  Constitution;"  that  the 
actual  freedom  of  all  slaves  resulted  from  these  prem 
ises,  and  should  be  practically  recognized  by  all 
authorities,  and  the  national  protection  guaranteed 
to  the  negro ;  and  that  by  virtue  of  the  first  article 
of  the  Constitution,  "  Congress  shall  assume  complete 
jurisdiction  of  such  vacated  territory,  .  .  .  and  will 
proceed  to  establish  therein  republican  forms  of 
government." 

It  will  be  seen  even  in  this  brief  synopsis  that  these 
resolutions  have  the  courage  of  their  logic,  and  that 
under  the  position  taken  here,  Sumner  could  hardly 
be  satisfied  with  the  form  of  the  Emancipation  Pro 
clamation.  He  himself  said  of  this  position,  in  his 
appendix  to  these  resolutions  in  his  Works :  — 

"  The  principle  here  enunciated  that  slavery,  being 
without  support  in  the  Constitution  or  in  natural  right, 
fell  with  the  local  governments  on  which  it  depended, 
seemed  to  Mr.  Sumner  impregnable,  and  he  never  ceased 
to  regret  that  it  was  not  authoritatively  announced  at  an 
early  day,  believing  that  such  a  juridical  truth  adopted  by 
the  government  would  have  smoothed  the  way,  while  it 
hastened  the  great  result." 

Neither  then  nor  afterward  could  he  be  made  to 
see  that  this  was  a  sacrifice  of  the  very  principle  for 
which  we  were  contending,  —  that  it  implied  the  very 
power  in  the  state  to  retire  from  the  Union  which  we 
denied. 

All  through  the  year  1862,  with  its  varying  fortunes 
in  the  field,  its  political  perplexities,  and  its  congres 
sional  entanglements,  Sumner  vigorously  advocated 
these  views ;  and  with  a  magnificent  inconsistency  he 


EMANCIPATION.  185 

still  advocated  the  liberation  of  the  negro  as  a  war 
measure,  while  he  demanded  the  emancipation  of  the 
slave  as  a  constitutional  duty.  Shortly  after  the  meet 
ing -of  the  Republican  state  convention  at  Worcester, 
whose  indorsement  had  been  given  him,  and  the 
night  before  that  meeting  of  the  Peoples'  conven 
tion  which  it  was  hoped  would  jeopardize  his  elec 
tion,  he  delivered  a  speech  in  Faneuil  Hall  on  the 
Emancipation  Proclamation,  which,  confessedly,  for 
eloquence  and  brilliancy  can  hardly  be  equalled  in  all 
the  fifteen  volumes  of  his  speeches.  It  was  a  vindi 
cation  of  his  own  course,  a  thanksgiving  and  shout  of 
triumph  over  the  first  Emancipation  Proclamation, 
brought  forth  scarcely  a  fortnight  before,  a  review  of 
the  war  and  its  issues,  a  plea  for  the  Union  and  Free 
dom.  If  anything  was  needed  to  prove  this  man's 
God-given  right  to  be  a  leader  of  men,  it  was  fur 
nished  by  such  magnificent  eloquence  as  this  speech. 
Upholding  the  administration,  holding  back  his  own 
dissatisfaction,  urging  the  people  to  new  patriotism, 
witnessing  to  the  moral  issues  involved,  and  rever 
ently  acknowledging  the  Providence  over  all  our 
troubled  affairs,  this  speech  more  than  makes  good 
the  claims  to  greatness  so  freely  made  for  Charles 
Sumner. 

There  has  been  no  such  leader  since  he  broke 
his  own  staff  of  power;  there  has  been  no  orator 
like  him  since  the  day  his  voice  ceased  from  earthly 
speech.  In  those  days,  when  men  listened  to  speeches 
as  for  their  lives,  and  decided  their  votes  by  their 
convictions,  when  political  action  was  determined  by 
principle  and  not  by  predilection  for  men,  it  was 


1 86  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

little  wonder  that  such  speeches  changed  the  course 
of  the  time.  This  was  his  hour  of  public  favour.  A 
vast  following  believed  him  beyond  his  fellows  in  all 
gifts  and  virtues,  and  gave  to  him  that  extreme  per 
sonal  devotion  which  is  the  happy  lot  of  a  hero ;  and 
he  had  also  that  still  greater  satisfaction,  the  power  to 
turn  the  wavering  to  a  certain  mind,  to  determine  the 
doubtful  and  inspire  the  strong.  Men  changed  their 
opinions  at  his  word ;  it  is  not  too  much  to  say,  men 
died  for  a  cause  because  he  had  persuaded  them  to 
live  for  it. 


SUMNER  AND    THE   SENATE.  187 


CHAPTER   XVII. 
1863-1865. 

SUMNER    AND    THE    SENATE.  FINANCIAL   AND   GENERAL 

LEGISLATION. APPOINTMENT  OF  CHIEF- JUSTICE  CHASE. 

—  PACIFIC   RAILROAD. 

THE  time  of  Congress  during  the  war  period  was 
occupied  with  the  legislation  necessary  to  its  con 
duct,  and  in  these  affairs  Sumner  bore  his  full  share ; 
but  except  in  matters  within  the  pale  of  our  foreign 
relations  or  relating  to  slavery,  his  influence  was  not 
great.  There  is  a  view  of  Sumner's  character  and 
career  which  cannot  be  ignored,  —  the  view  of  his 
associates  and  companions.  In  place  of  the  hero 
and  leader  he  was  to  the  country,  the  Senate  knew 
him  as  an  impracticable  theorist,  whose  views  were 
not  always  broad,  whose  opinions  were  often  so 
warped  by  his  wishes  that  his  judgment  could  not  be 
entirely  trusted,  yet  who  announced  himself  as  "  en 
tertaining  no  doubt "  of  his  entire  correctness,  — 
"  seeing  my  way  before  me  by  lights  that  cannot  de 
ceive,"  as  he  put  it ;  and  as  one  whose  measures  must 
always  be  altered  before  becoming  useful  or  even 
possible  law.  The  Senate  knew  him  also  as  a  fre 
quently  heavy  speaker,  largely  without  the  magnetism 
of  his  earlier  years,  pronouncing  orations  at  great 


1 88  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

length,  and  as  a  debater  more  distinguished  for  sharp 
ness  and  severity  than  for  self-control  and  courtesy, 
"  dogmatic  and  supercilious,  frequently  curt,  and  not 
wholly  considerate,  —  often  bearing  himself  as  if 
properly  doubtful  of  the  honesty,  good  sense,  and 
pure  intention  of  all  who  differ  with  him  on  what 
he  considers  an  essential  issue." 

He  was  known  to  his  associates,  too,  as  one  who 
was  in  a  constant  succession  of  small  quarrels  with 
the  men  around  him,  —  quarrels  which  he  allowed  to 
influence  both  his  view  of  public  affairs  and  his  votes 
to  an  astonishing  degree.  There  was  something  of 
the  rule  or  ruin  about  him  in  his  legislative  career,  — 
a  trait  to  which  he  was  personally  so  blind  that  he 
constantly  asserted  that  he  never  felt  the  slightest 
movements  of  revenge  or  enmity.  And  so  sincere 
was  this  judgment  of  himself  that  his  nearest  friends 
outside  of  the  circle  of  his  associates  never  could 
believe  that  he  did  thus  indulge  his  personal  feeling. 
In  truth,  he  so  identified  himself  with  his  policy,  and 
believed  so  thoroughly  all  who  opposed  him  to  be 
enemies  of  his  country,  that  he  considered  it  duty  to 
hinder  their  every  plan  and  denounce  all  their  mo 
tives.  He  knew  he  loved  his  country,  and  he  thought 
his  measures  the  only  right  measures  for  its  good. 
Thus  he  firmly  believed  it  patriotism,  and  not  per 
sonal  feeling,  that  ruled  his  conduct;  and  yet  in 
reality  no  man  ever  was  more  moulded  by  personal 
feeling.  It  was  the  key  to  his  action.  And  it  was  his 
greatest  glory  that  he  did  make  the  sacrifice  of  per 
sonal  feeling  when  principle  clearly  demanded  it; 
it  was  life  itself  he  gave  up  at  such  times. 


FINANCIAL  LEGISLATION.  189 

Many  of  the  measures  which  occupied  Congress 
were  financial.  The  need  of  procuring  money  for 
the  conduct  of  the  war  produced  the  Legal  Tender 
act,  for  which  the  authority  of  the  Constitution  was 
stretched  to  its  utmost  limit.  Sumner,  in  common 
with  many  others,  assented  to  the  necessity  while 
he  deplored  it.  The  national  banks  were  created, 
and  the  Internal  Revenue  tax  laid  ;  and  again  Sumner 
felt  that  "the  general  welfare  and  the  common  de 
fence  "  furnished  cause  sufficient  for  these  measures, 
and  for  securing  a  national  currency  to  be  "  to  the 
whole  country  like  the  horn  of  abundance."  These 
were  necessary  sinews  of  war,  and  whether  he 
doubted  or  approved  the  policy,  his  patriotism 
insisted  on  maintaining  it. 

It  can  well  be  believed  that  his  was  no  uncertain 
voice  on  the  employment  of  negro  troops,  the  exclu 
sion  of  the  coloured  man  from  the  witness-box,  col 
oured  suffrage  in  the  city  of  Washington,  or  the  final 
repeal  of  the  infamous  Fugitive  Slave  acts.  The 
long  discussion  over  the  question  of  equal  pay  for 
the  coloured  troops  reads  curiously  in  the  light  of 
history.  And  it  is  still  more  strange  to  find  James 
A.  Bayard  resigning  his  seat  because  he  would  not 
allow  the  constitutionality  of  that  oath  in  which  sen 
ators  of  the  United  States  declared  they  never  had 
given  aid  and  comfort  to  the  enemies  at  that  moment 
seeking  to  destroy  the  existence  of  their  country. 
Sumner  declared  in  the  debate  on  this  question,  — 

"Others  may  think  that  Jefferson  Davis,  Robert 
Toombs,  or  Judah  Benjamin  may  resume  his  seat  in 
this  body  on  taking  a  simple  oath  to  support  the  Con- 


190  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

stitution.  I  do  not  think  so.  Nothing  is  clearer  than 
this :  a  traitor  cannot  be  a  member  of  the  Senate.  But 
a  person  who  cannot  take  this  oath,  retroactive  though  it 
be,  must  have  been  a  traitor.  Once  a  traitor,  always  a 
traitor,  unless  when  changed  by  pardon  or  amnesty." 

These  words  sound  somewhat  strangely  to  the  ears 
of  a  later  generation  eager  to  condone  or  excuse 
treason,  but  they  were  the  deliberate  judgment  of 
one  who  knew  what  treason  meant.  And  it  is  doubt 
ful  whether  the  author  of  the  Civil  Rights  bill  would 
believe  the  time  had  come  to  wipe  this  oath  off  the 
statute-book  "  as  a  just  act  of  clemency  and  condona 
tion  "  until  the  leaders  of  this  treason  were  ready  to 
accept  the  principles  against  which  they  fought,  as 
well  as  the  results  of  defeat. 

Hatred  of  slavery  was  always  the  touchstone  that 
decided  Sumner's  constitutional  views.  For  its  sake 
he  came  to  hold  high  nationalistic  principles,  and 
he  did  not  falter  at  their  logic.  When  the  military 
situation  required  the  new  state  of  West  Virginia, 
unlike  most  of  his  own  colleagues  in  the  House  and 
senators  like  Trumbull,  he  had  no  hesitation  over  the 
power  to  divide  the  unwilling  state  of  Virginia,  no 
doubt  that  the  Wheeling  Legislature  was  the  real  and 
only  Legislature  of  that  state  ;  and  he  recognized  the 
logic  of  his  position  by  asserting  the  national  power 
to  prohibit  slavery  therein.  This  last  view  caused 
some  of  his  anti-slavery  associates  in  the  Senate  to 
hesitate  lest  they  coerce  the  people  of  West  Virginia  ! 
Sumner  had  the  courage  of  his  convictions  in  his 
position.  Thaddeus  Stevens  presented  it  somewhat 
more  boldly  when  he  declared  that  this  action  un- 


GENERAL  LEGISLATION.  191 

doubtedly  violated  the  Constitution,  but  that  the  re 
bellious  states  were  entitled  to  no  constitutional 
protection,  and  that  the  new  state  must  and  should 
be  created  under  the  unlimited  war  power.  It  was 
the  high  nationalistic  view  which  Sumner  had  always 
held  on  occasion,  and  which  had  developed  from  his 
first  more  constitutional  theory,  until  it  was  now  his 
settled  and  basal  conviction. 

Another  measure  showed  to  what  an  extent  he  car 
ried  this  view.  In  itself  of  trifling  import,  it  seemed 
to  Sumner  to  carry  far-reaching  results.  This  was  a 
bill  authorizing  all  railways  in  the  United  States  to 
convey  troops  and  munitions  of  war.  It  was  aimed 
at  a  railway  in  New  Jersey  which  had  obtained  a 
monopoly  of  that  service  from  the  state,  and  was 
intended  to  overset  that  grant  by  the  power  of  the 
general  government.  Sumner  fought  for  this  bill 
through  two  sessions,  on  the  high  nationalistic 
ground ;  but  it  was  opposed  and  finally  defeated  as 
a  dangerous  usurpation  of  power  on  the  part  of  the 
central  government.  It  is  interesting  to  compare 
it  with  recent  legislation,  to  mark  the  growth  of  the 
idea  of  centralization  in  the  quarter  of  a  century 
which  has  passed  since  then.  In  connection  with 
this  bill  also,  we  have  an  indirect  illustration  that 
Mr.  Sumner  was  much  like  other  men  to  those  who 
saw  him  day  by  day,  and  a  strong  side-light  on  those 
ever-interesting  relations  between  two  such  positive 
characters  as  Lincoln  and  Sumner.  The  private  diary 
of  Lincoln's  secretary,  Col.  John  G.  Nicolay,  gives 
us  this  curious  story,  lately  published  by  Nicolay  and 
Hay:- 


192  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

"I  went  to  the  President  this  afternoon  [Jan.  18, 
1865],  at  the  request  of  Mr.  Ashley,  on  a  matter  con 
necting  itself  with  the  pending  amendment  of  the  Con 
stitution.  The  Camden  and  Amboy  Railroad  interest 
promised  Mr.  Ashley  that  if  he  would  help  postpone  the 
Raritan  Railroad  Bill  over  this  session,  they  would  in 
return  make  the  New  Jersey  Democrats  help  about  the 
amendment,  either  by  their  votes  or  their  absence.  Sum- 
ner  being  the  Senate  champion  of  the  Raritan  Bill,  Ash« 
ley  went  to  him  to  ask  him  to  drop  it  for  this  session. 
Sumner,  however,  showed  reluctance  to  adopt  Mr.  Ash 
ley's  suggestion,  saying  he  hoped  the  amendment  would 
pass  anyhow,  etc.  Ashley  thought  he  discovered  in 
Sumner's  manner  two  reasons:  (i)  That  if  the  present 
Senate  resolution  [for  a  constitutional  amendment^  were 
not  adopted  by  the  House,  the  Senate  would  send  them 
another,  in  which  they  would  most  likely  adopt  Sumner's 
own  phraseology,  and  thereby  gratify  his  ambition  ;  and 
(2)  that  Sumner  thinks  the  defeat  of  the  Camden  and 
Amboy  monopoly  would  establish  a  principle  by  legisla 
tive  enactment  which  would  effectually  crush  out  the 
last  lingering  relics  of  the  States-rights  dogma.  Ashley 
therefore  desired  the  President  to  send  for  Sumner,  and 
urge  him  to  be  practical,  and  secure  the  passage  of  the 
amendment  in  the  manner  suggested  by  Mr.  Ashley. 
I  stated  these  points  to  the  President,  who  replied  at 
once :  *  I  can  do  nothing  with  Mr.  Sumner  in  these  mat 
ters.  While  Mr.  Sumner  is  very  cordial  with  me,  he  is 
making  his  history  in  an  issue  with  me  on  this  very 
point.  He  hopes  to  succeed  in  beating  the  President,  so 
as  to  change  this  government  from  its  original  form,  and 
make  it  a  strong  centralized  power.'  Then  calling  Mr. 
Ashley  into  the  room,  the  President  said  to  him,  '  I  think 
I  understand  Mr.  Sumner ;  and  I  think  he  would  be  all 
the  more  resolute  in  his  persistence  on  the  points  which 
Mr.  Nicolay  has  mentioned  to  me,  if  he  supposed  I  were 
at  all  watching  his  course  in  this  matter.'  " 


CHIEF-JUSTICE   CHASE.  193 

Sumner's  unconscious  habit  of  looking  at  all  things 
through  their  personal  relations  to  himself  or  his 
views,  received  curious  illustration  when  as  an  advo 
cate  of  peace  he  added  to  his  battle-flag  resolution 
another  forbidding  any  painting  in  the  Capitol  of 
a  victory  "  in  battle  with  our  fellow- citizens,"  but 
in  the  same  debate  advocated  the  purchase  of  Car 
penter's  picture  of  the  Emancipation  Proclamation. 
And  when,  a  little  later,  the  proposition  came  before 
the  Senate  to  add  the  bust  of  Taney  to  the  other 
heads  of  the  Chief- Justices  in  the  Supreme  Court 
room,  he  spoke  vehemently  against  it,  with  an  abuse 
of  the  Dred  Scott  decision  and  its  author  as  forcible 
and  unrestrained  as  his  powers  could  make  it.  He 
could  not  see  that  the  vacant  niche  he  desired  was 
a  greater  insult  to  history  than  any  fancied  affront  in 
all  the  names  of  all  the  victories  the  Union  armies 
had  ever  gained. 

The  appointment  of  Chase  to  the  place  of  Chief- 
Justice  was  a  matter  Sumner  had  much  at  heart. 
Immediately  upon  the  death  of  Taney,  in  October, 
1864,  he  urged  it  upon  the  President  in  season  and 
out  of  season,  personally  and  by  letter,  and  by  all 
the  influence  he  could  command  from  every  quar 
ter.  The  President  consulted  with  him  frequently 
and  at  length  upon  the  matter,  and  although  it  was 
from  the  beginning  Lincoln's  own  intention  and  de 
sire  to  appoint  Chase,  it  is  without  doubt  that  Sum 
ner's  words  were  potent  with  him.  A  circumstantial 
story  is  told  that  he  first  offered  the  place  to  Sumner 
himself,  but  this  statement  cannot  be  true,  for 
obvious  reasons.  Secretary  Chase's  brilliant  and 
13 


194  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

beautiful  daughter,  Mrs.  Sprague,  the  most  able 
politician  ever  known  in  the  list  of  distinguished 
American  women,  did  not  hesitate  to  charge  Sena 
tor  Sumner  directly  with  doing  what  he  could  thus 
to  "shelve"  her  father,  that  he  might  get  him  out 
of  his  own  path  to  the  White  House.  But  how 
ever  true  it  might  have  been  that  there  was  some 
lurking  feeling  of  this  sort,  the  conscious  motive 
with  Sumner  was  apparent  enough.  He  saw  that  the 
future  of  the  nation  required  a  Chief- Justice  whose 
decisions  should  uphold  the  great  anti- slavery  legisla 
tion  of  the  war,  and  he  felt  sure  of  the  great  leader 
of  the  extreme  radical  wing  of  the  anti- slavery  party. 
From  this  high  and  characteristic  motive,  therefore, 
he  did  what  he  could  to  bring  about  the  appointment 
of  the  man  who,  in  after  days,  under  the  fascination 
of  that  ambition  which  both  Lincoln  and  Sumner 
hoped  to  quench,  sacrificed  upon  the  altar  of  the 
presidential  nomination  much  of  the  legislation  he 
was  appointed  to  preserve. 

Few  matters  not  connected  with  the  war  came 
before  Congress  between  1861  and  1865  ;  but  occa 
sionally  Sumner  appeared  as  the  advocate  of  some 
lighter  measure  in  which  he  took  the  interest  natural 
to  him  from  his  old  habits,  —  such  as  the  use  of 
parchment  by  Congress,  or  the  duty  on  imported 
books;  and  in  1864  ne  made  a  proposal  for  a  civil- 
service  commission  which  he  never  afterward  fol 
lowed  up.  But  even  the  side  issues  were  mostly  of  a 
military  character,  —  such  as  the  creation  of  the  offices 
of  Admiral  and  Lieutenant-General,  the  establishment 
of  a  hospital  corps,  and  as  early  as  May,  1862,  the 


PACIFIC  RAILROAD.  195 

first  appearance  of  his  famous  resolution  that  the 
names  of  our  victories  should  not  be  inscribed  upon 
the  battle-flags.  Among  the  other  subjects  which  Sum- 
ner  took  up  was  the  promotion  of  the  great  scheme 
of  a  trans-continental  railroad.  In  these  days,  when 
Pacific  railways  have  long  been  the  ordinary  and 
multiplied  highways  of  traffic,  and  indeed  have  be 
come  but  counters  in  the  game  of  commerce,  we 
hardly  give  due  importance  to  this  first  great  work ; 
we  hardly  realize  how  daring  a  scheme  it  was,  or 
appreciate  the  courage,  the  faith,  the  patriotism, 
which  led  to  the  enormous  risks  and  desperate  la 
bours  of  its  first  projectors;  nor  do  we  always  re 
member  how  greatly  the  enterprise  contributed  to 
the  loyalty  of  the  Pacific  coast,  and  in  its  own  way 
helped  to  preserve  the  Union.  Sumner's  words  are 
trite  enough  now,  but  in  1863  they  were  illuminat 
ing  as  well  as  wise  :  — 

"  Let  the  road  be  built,"  he  writes,  "  and  its  influence 
will  be  incalculable.  People  will  wonder  that  the  world 
lived  so  long  without  it.  Conjoining  the  two  oceans,  it 
will  be  an  agency  of  matchless  power,  not  only  commer 
cial,  but  political.  It  will  be  a  new  girder  to  the  Union, 
a  new  help  to  business,  and  a  new  charm  to  life.  Per 
haps  the  imagination  is  most  impressed  by  the  thought 
of  travel  and  merchandise  winding  their  way  from  Atlan 
tic  to  Pacific  in  an  unbroken  line ;  but  I  incline  to 
believe  that  the  commercial  advantages  will  be  more 
apparent  in  the  opportunities  the  railroad  will  create  and 
quicken  everywhere  on  the  way.  New  homes  and  new 
towns  will  spring  up,  making  new  demand  for  labour  and 
supplies.  Civilization  will  be  projected  into  the  forest 


196  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

and  over  the  plain,  while  the  desert  is  made  to  yield  its 
increase.  There  is  no  productiveness  to  compare  with 
that  from  the  upturned  sod  which  receives  the  iron  rail. 
In  its  crop  are  schoolhouses  and  churches,  cities  and 
States." 


ELECTION  OF  LINCOLN  AND  JOHNSON.      197 


CHAPTER   XVIII. 
1863-1865. 

ELECTION    OF  LINCOLN  AND   JOHNSON. SUMNER*S   POSI 
TION.  GENERAL     LEGISLATION.  THE   THIRTEENTH 

AMENDMENT. REPEAL    OF    FUGITIVE    SLAVE   ACTS. 

RECONSTRUCTION   IN  LOUISIANA. 

THE  fortunes  of  war  slowly  turned  in  our  favour.  The 
capture  of  Port  Hudson  and  the  double  victories  of 
Vicksburg  and  Gettysburg  changed  dismay  and  ter 
rible  anxiety  into  triumph,  but  the  stern  necessity 
of  a  draft  to  fill  our  depleted  ranks  created  an  enemy 
in  the  rear.  The  terrible  New  York  riots  answered 
our  victories  almost  to  the  echo,  and  the  resulting 
alarm  was  by  no  means  dispelled  by  our  success  at 
Lookout  Mountain.  Nevertheless,  1864  was  the  last 
year  of  the  war.  The  promise  of  the  end  was  with 
Sheridan  in  the  Shenandoah  Valley ;  with  Sherman,  at 
Atlanta ;  with  Grant,  fighting  it  out  through  the  sum 
mer  before  Richmond.  Northern  writers  consider 
Gettysburg  and  Vicksburg  as  the  critical  battles  of 
the  war ;  but  many  in  the  South  believe  their  cause 
lost  at  Winchester. 

The  political  horizon  was  still  overcast.  Notwith 
standing  that  we  had  by  law  forever  abolished  slavery, 
and  by  the  strong  right  arm  of  war  were  daily  making 
freedom  a  fact  and  the  Union  something  more  than 


198  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

a  name,  there  was  still  a  vast  amount  of  dissatisfac 
tion  with  the  administration.  In  the  Cabinet,  in 
Congress,  in  the  country,  there  was  secret  or  open 
determination  that  the  presidential  campaign  of  1864 
should  put  some  one  else  in  the  place  of  Lincoln. 
He  moved  too  slowly  for  the  radicals,  too  fast  for  the 
conservatives.  But  if  the  Republicans  were  divided, 
the  Democrats  were  still  more  so,  and  party  lines 
were  much  entangled,  for  men  called  by  every 
political  name  were  to  be  found  in  all  divisions  on 
both  sides.  The  witches'  broth  was  largely  com 
pounded  of  personal  rivalries,  animosities,  and  dis 
appointments,  and  personal  ambition  fed  upon  it 
greedily.  Chase  did  not  neglect  to  nurse  his  op 
portunity;  Grant  was  vainly  besought  to  allow  the 
use  of  his  name ;  McClellan  was  ready  for  anything 
that  would  secure  the  nomination.  The  first  step 
in  the  radical  campaign  was  taken  in  Congress  by 
a  group  of  members  from  both  Houses,  in  which 
Sumner  was  prominent.  They  prepared  a  circular, 
known,  from  the  only  name  that  appeared,  as  the 
"  Pomeroy  circular,"  setting  forth  their  dissatisfaction 
with  Lincoln,  their  conviction  that  the  war  should 
be  prosecuted  more  vigorously,  and  their  support 
of  Chase,  and  this  they  distributed  broadcast  over 
the  land.  The  circular  raised  a  storm  of  wrath  in 
the  country,  and  promoted  an  early  enthusiasm  for 
the  President  far  enough  from  the  purpose  intended 
by  its  framers.  The  open  declaration  of  Ohio  for 
Lincoln  obliged  Chase  to  withdraw  his  name,  and 
the  unexpected  feeling  developed  caused  most  of 
the  men  who  had  conceived  the  plan  hastily  to  with- 


ELECTION  OF  LINCOLN  AND  JOHNSON.      199 

draw  their  support.  Senator  Pomeroy,  at  least,  had 
the  courage  of  convictions  which  others  were  unwill 
ing  to  avow.  Notwithstanding  the  failure  of  this  first 
attempt  to  make  Chase  president,  the  intention  re 
mained  throughout  the  whole  summer,  and  became  an 
important  factor  in  many  political  movements.  Es 
pecially  did  it  increase  the  friction  between  Seward 
and  Chase,  and  even  between  Chase  and  the  Presi 
dent,  and  resulted,  three  weeks  after  Mr.  Lincoln's 
renomination,  in  the  resignation  of  Chase  from  the 
Treasury  Department.  The  appointment  of  Fessen- 
den  as  his  successor,  satisfactory  as  it  was  to  the 
country,  had  political  connections  not  without  mean 
ing  in  the  great  political  strife  waging  in  the  North. 

The  attempt  of  the  "  radical  men  of  the  Nation  " 
to  crystallize  their  adherents  round  Fremont  proved 
so  weak  that  their  candidate  withdrew  before  elec 
tion,  and  all  other  organized  efforts  against  the 
President  met  with  a  similar  fate.  When  the  Re 
publican  convention  met  in  Baltimore,  it  nominated 
Lincoln  unanimously,  but  this  apparently  foregone 
conclusion  was  by  no  means  brought  about  without 
effort.  The  determination  for  some  more  radical 
candidate  had  not  subsided,  and  management  and 
political  organization  were  necessary  to  bring  about 
the  result.  The  radical  element  was  heard  more 
than  once  in  the  preliminary  struggles,  and  at  last, 
defeated  in  its  chief  desire,  determined  still  to  make 
itself  felt  and  to  be  officially  recognized.  A  contest 
therefore  arose  over  the  place  of  Vice-President.  To 
the  final  nomination  of  Andrew  Johnson  three  lead 
ing  elements  contributed  :  the  influence  of  New  York, 


200  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

the  influence  of  Massachusetts,  and  the  influence 
of  President  Lincoln.  The  delegation  from  Massa 
chusetts  felt,  and  with  some  reason,  that  they  did 
much  to  bring  about  the  result;  and  it  is  beyond 
question  that  Mr.  Sumner's  influence  and  Mr.  Sum- 
ner's  wishes  were  strong  upon  them.  The  three 
prominent  candidates  for  what  then  seemed  only  a 
dignified  and  formal  office  were  the  Vice- President 
Hannibal  Hamlin,  to  whom  the  nomination  was  due ; 
Daniel  N.  Dickinson,  of  New  York,  and  Andrew 
Johnson,  of  Tennessee.  Mr.  Lincoln,  always  an 
astute  politician,  knew  that  in  the  political  crisis 
which  was  upon  the  country,  the  wavering  support  of 
the  Democrats  must  be  held  to  the  administration, 
and  he  believed  it  necessary  that  the  Vice-President 
should  be  identified  with  that  body.  This  feeling 
he  refused  to  make  public  even  under  the  greatest 
pressure,  but  it  was  discussed  freely  in  private  con 
ferences,  and  well  known  in  trusted  quarters.  It  was 
hardly  a  secret  then,  and  it  has  long  since  ceased 
to  be  a  secret,  that  confidential  embassies  sounded 
different  prominent  Democrats,  among  them  Gen 
eral  Butler  and  Governor  Johnson,  —  the  first  refusing 
curtly,  the  second  eagerly  welcoming  the  suggestion. 
This  desire  of  Lincoln  was  in  no  sense  personal,  but 
a  firm  conviction  that  the  welfare  of  the  country  ab 
solutely  required  such  a  course.  As  so  often  in  our 
history,  the  internal  politics  of  the  state  of  New  York 
proved  a  disturbing  element.  Mr.  Seward's  friends 
would  not  allow  the  choice  of  Dickinson,  and  so  once 
more  Thurlow  Weed  dominated  the  action  of  a  Re 
publican  convention.  The  Massachusetts  delegation 


SUMNER' S  POSITION'.  20 1 

were  in  their  turn  influenced  by  personal  prejudice, 
though  probably  without  their  knowledge.  Sumner 
had  for  some  time  been  in  a  chronic  state  of  quarrel 
with  Fessenden.  It  was  a  matter  of  temperament 
largely,  and  it  had  no  great  cause,  but  the  rather  grew 
out  of  personal  incompatibilities  and  the  wish  of 
each  to  control  the  policy  of  the  Senate.  Their 
differences  were  frequently  made  up,  and  as  often 
broke  out  again.  It  is  impossible,  in  listening  to 
contemporary  anecdotes  of  their  relations,  to  avoid 
the  conclusion  that  in  this  case,  as  in  so  many  others, 
Sumner  felt  difference  of  opinion  to  be  a  personal 
affront,  although  he  speedily  condoned  these  affronts 
when  his  opponent  was  politic  enough  to  agree  to  his 
course  and  praise  his  action.  Certainly,  his  hostility 
and  consequent  distrust  of  Fessenden  and  Fessen- 
den's  friend,  Hannibal  Hamlin,  had  much  to  do 
with  his  views  as  to  the  Vice-Presidency  in  1864; 
while,  on  the  other  hand,  he  greatly  admired  John 
son,  who  was  just  then  in  so  radical  a  mood  as  to 
seize  every  opportunity  to  antagonize  the  President. 
Largely  without  their  knowledge,  Sumner's  influ 
ence  was  strong  upon  his  friends  both  from  his 
own  state  and  elsewhere,  to  persuade  them  to  the 
choice  of  Johnson,  —  a  result  which  it  was  believed  at 
the  time  was  largely  due  to  the  Massachusetts  dele 
gation.  What  he  thought  of  it,  appeared  after  the 
convention  when  these  men  came  to  Washington 
to  consult  with  him.  Speaking  to  one  of  his  col 
leagues,  a  strong  friend  of  Hamlin,  they  justified 
their  action  thus :  "  Do  you  know  what  Sumner 
says?  He  says  he  wishes  the  ticket  were  turned 


202  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

round,  and  it  was  Johnson  and  Lincoln."  And  in 
still  less  guarded  phrase  the  Senator  complained  to 
another  of  his  colleagues  that  the  American  people 
were  so  deluded  as  to  renominate  Lincoln,  for  the 
weakest  man  in  the  Massachusetts  delegation  was 
better  qualified  to  be  President.  Nevertheless,  he 
loyally  upheld  the  ticket  with  the  whole  force  of 
his  power  and  eloquence. 

If  anything  was  needed  to  prove  the  neces 
sity  of  Lincoln's  well-known  phrase  uttered  at 
this  juncture,  that  it  was  not  best  "to  swap 
horses  in  the  middle  of  the  stream,"  it  was  fur 
nished  by  the  course  of  events  during  the  summer. 
The  country,  and  especially  the  Northwest,  was 
honeycombed  by  secret  societies  of  a  military  char 
acter  whose  purposes  included  organized  arson  and 
murder,  and  whose  avowed  object  was  the  capture 
of  that  section  and  the  establishment  of  a  separate 
confederacy,  affiliated  to  that  of  the  South.  In 
addition  to  this,  schemes  were  planned,  and  in 
some  cases,  attempted,  from  the  safe  seclusion  of 
Canada,  to  burn  the  Northern  cities  or  devastate 
them  with  yellow  fever.  The  loud  protestations 
of  those  who  still  sympathized  with  the  South  per 
suaded  the  Confederate  leaders  that  the  North  was 
so  permeated  with  disaffection  as  to  need  only  such 
opportunity  and  encouragement  to  bring  about  a 
general  domestic  warfare ;  and  much  aid  and  com 
fort  was  given  this  idea  by  the  conduct  of  men 
of  such  opposite  opinions  as  George  Ticknor  Curtis 
and  Horace  Greeley,  who  joined  in  a  frantic  cry 
for  peace.  With  them  were  the  business  interests 


ELECTION  OF  LINCOLN  AND  JOHNSON.      203 

of  the  country,  groaning  under  the  burdens  of  war ; 
and  that  section  of  the  Democrats  which  loved 
the  South  under  any  circumstances,  hastened  to 
add  their  demands  for  peace  at  any  price.  The 
Confederacy  made  bootless  overtures  of  a  semi-offi 
cial  character  through  its  Vice- President,  Alexander 
H.  Stephens,  and  by  an  authorized  commission. 
Lincoln  went  so  far  as  to  offer  to  listen  to  these 
proposals,  especially  persuaded  thereto  in  the  latter 
case  by  Greeley,  all  whose  great  influence  was  de 
manding  peace,  peace,  always  peace.  But  in  the 
end,  all  efforts  made  it  more  evident  that  peace 
could  come  only  by  one  of  two  ways,  —  by  submit 
ting  to  slavery  or  by  conquering  it.  In  the  midst 
of  this  open  opposition  and  secret  intrigue,  the 
Democratic  convention  nominated  McClellan  and 
Pendleton,  —  the  latter  closely  connected  with  the 
South  by  family  ties,  —  declared  the  war  a  failure, 
and  demanded  an  immediate  cessation  of  hostilities. 
These  complications  did  not  hinder  the  more 
radical  Republicans  from  stirring  up  more  strife. 
In  December,  1863,  President  Lincoln  attempted 
a  partial  reconstruction  of  the  border  states  by  a 
proclamation  issued  in  virtue  of  his  military  power. 
This  was  a  direct  blow  at  the  theory  held  by  Sumner 
of  state  suicide ;  for  it  must  not  be  forgotten  that 
one  moving  cause  for  discovering  this  theory  was  the 
desire  to  bring  reconstruction  and  the  future  of  the 
South  under  the  hands  of  a  radical  Congress,  rather 
than  the  cautious  and  conservative  President.  To 
meet  this  action  of  the  President,  Henry  Winter 
Davis  introduced  a  bill  into  the  House  to  bring  the 


204  CHARLES   SUMNER. 

matter  under  the  control  of  Congress  and  destroy 
the  effect  of  the  proclamation.  When  this  measure 
reached  the  Senate,  Sumner  was  specially  earnest 
for  its  adoption,  and  it  was  a  deep  disappointment 
to  him  when  it  was  finally  vetoed  by  the  President. 
In  July,  Lincoln  issued  another  proclamation,  some 
what  in  the  nature  of  a  brief  for  his  view,  explaining 
his  position  that  such  a  policy  made  the  fatal  ad 
mission  that  the  seceding  states  had  taken  them 
selves  out  of  the  Union,  and  reaffirming  the  first 
proclamation.  It  was  hardly  to  be  expected  that 
the  radical  wing,  already  disaffected  as  it  was,  and 
sincerely  doubting  Lincoln's  hatred  of  slavery, 
would  receive  such  a  blow  in  quiet ;  and  Ben. 
Wade  in  behalf  of  the  "  Senate  Committee,"  with 
Winter  Davis  representing  the  House,  issued  a 
violent  manifesto  dealing  with  Lincoln  in  no  meas 
ured  terms,  and  intended  even  then,  at  the  last 
moment,  to  supersede  him  as  the  Republican 
candidate. 

Changes  in  the  Cabinet  created  new  points  of 
soreness  in  the  Republican  ranks.  Montgomery 
Blair's  resignation  resulted  in  a  crop  of  personal 
differences  and  factional  quarrels,  while  Chase's  ef 
forts  for  the  place  of  Chief- Justice  produced  a  like 
effect.  Numberless  other  greater  or  less  appoint 
ments  made  their  usual  excitement  and  left  behind 
them  fair-weather  friends  and  bitter  enemies.  The 
new  draft  created  disturbance  and  distress.  The 
desperate  efforts  of  the  Confederacy  to  secure  its 
recognition  in  France  and  England  wanted  only  a 
hair's-breadth  of  success,  and  added  to  our' alarm 


ELECTION  OF  LINCOLN  AND  JOHNSON.      205 

at  home.  Seldom  has  the  democratic  principle  of 
government  been  put  to  a  greater  strain  than  during 
the  dreadful  summer  of  1864.  But  Winchester  and 
Mobile  and  Atlanta  saved  our  cause  in  Europe, 
swelled  the  triumph  of  the  administration  at  the 
polls,  and  brought  the  end  of  fighting  within  sight 
of  the  troops. 

During  the  long  and  earnest  campaign,  Sumner 
did  not  allow  his  political  anxieties  to  weaken  the 
tones  of  his  patriotism.  In  two  of  his  speeches  —  at 
Faneuil  Hall  and  at  Cooper  Institute  —  he  declared 
himself  in  this  wise  :  — 

"  I  have  no  hesitation  in  saying  that  in  voting  against 
Abraham  Lincoln  you  will  not  only  vote  against  Freedom 
and  for  Slavery,  but  you  will  vote  against  your  country 
and  for  the  Rebellion.  There  can  be  no  third  party  now, 
whether  in  the  name  of  moderation  or  in  the  name  of  pro 
gress,  as  there  can  be  no  third  party  between  right  and 
wrong,  between  good  and  evil,  between  the  Almighty 
Throne  and  Satan.  There  can  be  but  two  parties  here. 
Choose  ye  between  them.  One  is  the  party  of  the  coun 
try,  with  Abraham  Lincoln  as  its  chief,  and  with  Freedom 
as  its  glorious  watchword,  and  the  other  is  the  party  of 
the  Rebellion,  with  Jefferson  Davis  as  its  chief,  and  with 
no  other  watchword  than  Slavery.  .  .  .  As  in  the  choice 
of  Hercules,  there  are  here  before  you  two  roads,  —  one 
leading  to  virtue  and  renown,  the  other  leading  to  crime 
and  shame.  Choose  ye  between  them.  Vote  against 
Abraham  Lincoln,  if  you  can,  or  stay  at  home  and  sulk, 
if  you  will;  you  have  only,  as  a  next  step, to  go  over  to 
the  enemy." 

And  in  a  brilliant  and  able  summary,  he  goes  on 'to 
review  the  work  and  expound  the  principles  of  the 


206  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

Republican  party.  "  I  regard  it  an  honour,"  he  says, 
"  to  belong  to  this  party,  so  great  in  what  it  has  al 
ready  accomplished,  and  greater  still  in  what  it  pro 
poses.  Other  parties  have  performed  their  work  and 
perished.  The  Republican  party  will  live  forever  in 
the  gratitude  of  all  who  love  liberty  and  rejoice  in 
the  triumphs  of  civilization."  The  Cooper  Union 
speech  was  in  his  most  elaborate  style,  —  a  great 
oration.  It  does  not  lend  itself  well  to  quotation ; 
but  a  single  sentence  will  show  in  its  first  clause  how 
little  Sumner  realized  that  in  his  doctrine  of  state 
suicide  he  had  forgotten  his  logic,  and  in  its  second 
proposition  hints  at  one  aspect  of  the  war  which  is 
still  a  problem  when  outward  peace  has  become  a 
tradition :  — 

"  The  triumph  of  the  Rebellion  will  be  not  only  the 
triumph  of  belligerent  Slavery,  but  also  the  triumph  of 
State  Rights,  to  this  extent,  —  first,  that  any  State,  in  the 
exercise  of  its  own  lawless  will,  may  abandon  its  place  in 
the  Union,  and,  secondly,  that  the  constitutional  verdict 
of  the  majority,  as  in  the  election  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  is 
not  binding.  With  these  two  rules  of  conduct,  in  con 
formity  with  which  the  Rebellion  was  organized,  there 
can  be  no  limit  to  disunion." 

The  party  in  which  Sumner  was  a  leader  was  re 
sponsible  that  their  very  zeal  for  emancipation 
blinded  their  eyes  to  the  second  of  these  great 
difficulties,  and  left  their  country  with  a  half-settled 
problem  to  vex  it  for  more  than  one  generation; 
and  the  end  is  not  yet. 

Thanks  to  our  generals,  the  election  in  November 
was  an  overwhelming  triumph.  Alexander  Stephens 


GENERAL  LEGISLATION.  207 

was  right  in  his  prophecy  that  Confederate  success  in 
battle  would  elect  McClellan,  while  Confederate  defeat 
on  the  field  would  bring  certain  Democratic  defeat  at 
the  polls.  The  November  election  proved  what  Sum- 
ner  had  prayed  that  it  might  be,  "  the  final  peal  of 
thunder  which  shall  clear  the  sky  and  fill  the  heavens 
with  glory."  Said  he  in  Faneuil  Hall  on  the  evening 
of  the  election,  — 

"  Let  the  glad  tidings  go  forth  to  all  the  people  of  the 
United  States,  at  length  made  wholly  free ;  to  foreign 
countries  ;  to  the  whole  family  of  man ;  to  posterity ;  to 
the  martyred  band  who  have  fallen  in  battle  for  their 
country ;  to  the  angels  above,  —  ay,  and  to  the  devils 
below,  —  that  this  Republic  shall  live,  for  Slavery  is  dead. 
This  is  the  great  joy  we  now  announce  to  the  world. 
From  this  time  forward  the  Rebellion  is  subdued ;  Patriot- 
Unionists  in  the  Rebel  States,  take  courage !  Freedmen, 
slaves  no  longer,  be  of  good  cheer  !  The  hour  of  deliver 
ance  has  arrived." 

The  last  session  of  the  Thirty-eighth  Congress  — 
the  period  between  Lincoln's  election  and  his  assas 
sination —  was  an  eventful  time  for  the  country, 
but  a  time  of  development  and  ratification.  This 
Congress,  which  began  its  work  in  the  gray  dawn  of 
Gettysburg,  steadfastly  kept  on  its  way  looking  to  a 
hopeful  future,  furnishing  the  sinews  of  war  by  such 
vigorous  measures  as  the  internal  revenue  and  income 
taxes  and  the  national  banks,  upholding  the  odious 
but  necessary  drafts,  wiping  out  the  Fugitive  Slave 
law,  and  starting  upon  the  constitutional  amend 
ments.  Its  second  and  closing  session  finished  these 
labours  in  the  glorious  sunshine  of  military  and 


208  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

political  victory.  The  great  war  serpent,  whose  head 
was  before  Richmond,  and  whose  coils  stretched  all 
the  way  from  Atlanta  to  the  sea,  was  slowly  and 
surely  crushing  the  Confederacy.  At  home  the  num 
berless  birds  of  evil  omen  that  flourished  in  the 
darkness  disappeared  as  the  light  grew  strong  and 
steady.  Statesmen  began  to  think  of  the  afterward, 
and  to  plan  for  the  times  of  a  peace  whose  terms 
should  be  settled  neither  at  Richmond  nor  Niagara, 
not  yet  in  London,  but  in  Washington.  The  Eman 
cipation  Proclamation  bore  its  own  fruit.  The  first 
of  the  great  amendments  to  the  Constitution  which 
are  the  real  results  of  the  war,  was  debated  in 
Congress  from  December,  1863,  until  the  last  day 
of  January,  1865.  On  that  day,  amid  a  scene  in  the 
House  of  Representatives  of  unparalleled  excitement 
and  joy,  Congress  finished  the  work,  and  adopted 
the  amendment  prohibiting  slavery  throughout  the 
territory  of  the  United  States,  and  striking  out  those 
passages  of  the  third  paragraph  of  the  Constitution 
which  recognized  human  property  and  based  con 
gressional  representation  on  slaves.  The  amendment 
was  not  ratified  for  ten  months  longer;  but  the 
legislative  work  began  with  the  first  weeks  of  the 
first  session  of  the  Thirty-eighth  Congress,  and  ended 
in  the  last  weeks  of  its  last  session.  Sumner  did  not 
take  great  part  in  the  debate.  In  fact,  he  believed 
a  constitutional  amendment  undesirable,  being  a 
confession  that  the  Constitution  needed  amend 
ment,  a  doctrine  incompatible  with  his  interpreta 
tion  of  that  instrument.  And  he  laboured  much  in 
private  to  bring  his  associates  in  both  Houses  to  the 


THE    THIRTEENTH  AMENDMENT.         209 

opinion  that  a  simple  statute  was  all  that  was  neces 
sary.  Especially  did  he  seek  to  convince  Thaddeus 
Stevens,  the  leader  of  the  House,  but  quite  in  vain. 
Mr.  Stevens  humorously  told  him  that  if  this  was  the 
true  doctrine,  nevertheless,  "  No  other  fool  but  you  and 
I  and  Kelley  will  believe  it !  "  Sumner  finally  himself 
changed  his  position,  and  at  the  last  spoke  in  favour 
of  the  resolution  on  the  occasion  of  offering  a  verbal 
amendment.  This  somewhat  laboured  effort  was 
chiefly  devoted  to  reiterating  his  well-known  position 
that  the  Constitution  did  not  permit  slavery,  that  the 
Declaration  of  Independence  upheld  Freedom,  and 
that  we  needed  but  a  statute  to  wipe  out  slavery. 
But  he  declared  himself  desirous  to  "  strike  at  slavery 
wherever  I  can  hit  it ;  "  and  for  that  reason  he  sup 
ported  the  amendment,  and  even  sought  to  alter 
its  phraseology  and  base  it  upon  the  French  idea 
of  equality,  rather  than  upon  our  English  inheritance 
of  liberty. 

Among  other  measures  hanging  upon  it  was  the 
establishment,  after  much  opposition,  of  the  Freed- 
man's  Bureau,  —  a  measure  introduced  and  cham 
pioned  by  Senator  Sumner,  who  termed  it,  with  his 
singular  felicity  at  phrases,  "  a  bridge  from  slavery 
unto  freedom." 

Interspersed  with  the  debate  on  the  Thirteenth 
Amendment,  was  another  of  importance  only  sec 
ond  to  it,  —  that  upon  the  repeal  of  the  Fugitive 
Slave  laws.  This  was  Sumner's  own  bill,  and  he 
gave  it  active  and  persistent  support.  As  he  said 
in  his  main  speech  upon  it,  "  I  was  chosen  to  the 
Senate  for  the  first  time  immediately  after  the  pas- 
14 


210  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

sage  of  the  infamous  Act  of  1851.  If  at  that  elec 
tion  I  received  from  the  people  of  Massachusetts 
any  special  charge,  it  was  to  use  my  best  endeavours 
to  secure  the  repeal  of  this  atrocity.  I  began  the 
work  in  the  first  session  I  was  here.  God  grant 
that  I  may  end  it  to-day  ! " 

The  difficulties  in  the  way  were  partly  questions 
of  constitutional  interpretation,  and  to  some  ex 
tent  concerned  certain  consequences  of  the  repeal. 
Sumner  had  little  appreciation  of  such  obstacles, 
and  he  was  impatient  of  the  six  months'  delay,  but  in 
the  end  he  saw  "  this  atrocity  "  forever  disappear  from 
the  statute-book,  and  freedom  was  at  last  the  legal 
possession  of  all  his  brethren,  black  and  white  alike. 
In  his  speech  on  this  measure,  he  said  of  Granville 
Sharp  that  which  may  well  and  fitly  describe  his 
own  high  motive  :  — 

"He  knew  well  that  there  was  no  statute  of  limita 
tions  against  principles,  and  better  still  that  principles 
must  finally  prevail  over  precedents.  Principles  are 
immortal,  and  bloom  with  perpetual  youth  ;  precedents 
are  mortal,  and  die  from  age,  decrepitude,  and  decay. 
Against  principles,  precedents  may  for  a  while  prevail ; 
but  the  time  comes  when  that  which  is  mortal  must 
yield  to  that  which  is  immortal." 

Unfortunately  for  the  country,  none  of  the  great 
war  problems  were  presented  to  us  single  and  simple. 
The  conquest  of  the  South  was  by  degrees;  and 
through  our  peculiar  relations  to  the  rebellious  states, 
we  were  constantly  obliged  to  consider  questions 
applicable  in  one  section,  but  altogether  premature 
in  another ;  and  action  in  one  quarter  was  hampered 


RECONSTRUCTION  IN  LOUISIANA.        211 

by  its  effect  in  quite  a  different  direction.  Decisions 
affecting  the  country  were  determined  by  the  peculiar 
circumstances  of  a  single  section,  and  issues  which 
concerned  our  whole  after-history  were  decided  by 
their  influence  on  a  military  situation.  It  was  even 
necessary  to  fix  the  status  of  a  conquered  peo 
ple  before  the  terms  or  time  of  capitulation  could 
be  foretold.  To  these  things  must  be  attributed 
some  of  the  mistakes  of  wise  men.  When  his  prem 
ises  are  undetermined,  no  man  can  be  blamed  for 
arriving  at  wrong  conclusions.  The  statesmen  of 
1864  were  honestly  of  many  minds  as  to  wisdom  and 
duty  in  the  matter  of  reconstruction.  The  question 
was  constantly  recurring  in  one  form  or  another,  and 
came  definitely  before  Congress  in  connection  with 
Louisiana,  which  was  so  far  under  our  nominal  con 
trol  that  President  Lincoln  thought  reconstruction 
might  begin.  Congress  was  of  the  same  mind ;  and 
bills  were  introduced  into  both  Houses,  recognizing  a 
civil  government  in  Louisiana  which  should  proceed 
under  the  old  constitution  and  laws  of  that  state,  but 
should  act  under  the  protection  of  our  troops.  The 
measure  met  the  vigorous  opposition  of  both  parties. 
The  Republican  opposition  came  largely  from  those 
who  thought  the  bill  too  severe  in  its  requirements, 
too  sweeping  in  the  authority  assumed  by  the  Presi 
dent  or  given  to  the  military  governor,  and  too  reac 
tionary  in  its  return  to  ante-bellum  pro-slavery  laws. 
Sumner  opposed  it,  however,  because  it  was  not 
sweeping  enough.  In  his  view  the  President  had 
authority  for  this  and  much  more,  and  should  exer 
cise  it.  Until  a  new  government  was  formed,  and 
that  a  government  based  on  the  equality  of  the  black 


212  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

race,  he  would  have  nothing  to  do  with  it ;  and  op 
pose  it  he  did,  with  language  which  may  be  termed 
vituperative.  The  phrases  he  had  been  wont  to  hurl 
in  the  face  of  the  slavemaster  now  did  new  duty  for 
the  policy  of  the  President.  Tljis  was  a  pet  project 
with  Lincoln,  and  one  upon  which  he  built  many 
hopes.  The  difficulty  with  Lincoln  was  his  logic ; 
more  capable  of  an  unprejudiced  view  than  Sumner, 
he  could  not  twist  his  law  and  his  interpretations  to 
suit  his  wishes.  Thus  in  his  theories  he  was  the 
slave  of  his  logic,  but  in  practice  he  often  freed  him 
self  from  its  bonds.  He  did  not  hesitate  to  dispute 
his  theory  by  his  action  if  necessary,  as  in  fact  he  did 
in  the  case  of  Virginia  a  little  later.  Sumner,  on  the 
other  hand,  was  above  and  beyond  logic,  and  basing 
his  action  on  what  he  believed  ought  to  be  true,  he 
would  not  turn  about  or  change  that  action.  He 
"  believed  his  dictum  was  a  divination."  This  Loui 
siana  scheme  thwarted  once  and  forever  his  theory  of 
state  suicide  and  his  hope  of  territorial  control,  and 
he  would  not  support  it,  —  nay,  more,  he  would  defeat 
it ;  and  he  did  defeat  it  by  the  somewhat  puerile 
method  of  talking  against  time.  In  the  last  days  of 
the  session  he  piled  his  desk  high  with  documents, 
and  announced  that  he  intended,  by  the  help  of  lib 
eral  quotations  from  these  books,  to  talk  until  the 
session  expired,  thus  killing  three  great  bills,  —  a  tax, 
a  tariff,  and  an  appropriation  bill.  Perforce  the  Sen 
ate  submitted  to  him,  and  allowed  the  Louisiana 
measure  to  drop.  That  astute  observer,  Samuel 
Bowles,  a  constituent  and  supporter  of  Sumner,  char 
acterized  this  action  as  unjustifiable,  undignified,  and 
disgraceful ;  but  other  men  felt  differently.  Edward 


UNIVERSITY  j 

'       213 


L.  Pierce,  a  prominent  Abolitionist  and  always  one 
of  Sumner's  keenest  admirers  and  warmest  friends, 
wrote  him  from  Boston,  "  God  bless  you  a  thousand 
times  for  your  indomitable  resistance  to  the  admission 
of  Louisiana  with  her  caste  system  !  This  afternoon 
some  forty  gentlemen  dined  at  Bird's  room,  and  all, 
nemine  dissentiente,  approved  it,  and  with  full  praise." 
And  others  were  even  more  congratulatory.  All  the 
world  knows  with  what  tact  Lincoln  managed  the 
delicate  question  of  their  personal  relations  at  this 
juncture,  avoiding  that  personal  difference  so  easy  to 
create  with  Sumner.  A  week  later,  on  the  day  of  in 
auguration,  Lincoln  by  a  note  in  his  own  hand  asked  the 
Senator  to  escort  Mrs.  Lincoln  to  the  inaugural  ball, 
where  all  might  see  that  Lincoln  did  not  intend  to 
govern  by  his  own  prejudices,  and  that  he  recognized 
Sumner  as  sincerely  patriotic,  though  to  his  mind 
dogmatically  mistaken.  Whether  we  believe  the 
President's  vain  attempt  to  apply  logic  to  a  situation 
which  was  too  anomalous  for  any  logic  was  the  better 
plan,  or  that  Sumner's  drastic  and  extra-constitutional 
severity  would  in  fact  have  been  the  wiser  treatment 
of  the  problem,  in  this  particular  case  the  result  was 
fortunate.  Lincoln's  great  wisdom  and  tact  and 
readiness  to  change  one  plan  for  a  new  and  better 
one  might  have  made  a  success  of  his  attempt  at 
resurrecting  a  putrid  corpse,  but  Providence  put 
the  affairs  of  the  South  into  different  hands.  It  is 
certain  that  in  the  hands  of  Andrew  Johnson  this 
plan  would  have  been  an  awful  failure  ;  and  though 
Sumner  could  not  foresee  the  event,  his  course  unex 
pectedly  produced  a  fortunate  result. 


214  CHARLES  SUMNER. 


CHAPTER   XIX. 

1865. 

CLOSE    OF    THE   WAR.  —  ASSASSINATION    OF    LINCOLN.  — 
SUMNER   AND   JOHNSON. 

THE  second  inauguration  of  Lincoln  seemed  the  be 
ginning  of  the  end  to  men  who  did  not  dream  of 
the  legacy  the  war  was  to  leave  behind.  The  beau 
tiful  words  with  which  he  closed  his  speech  to  the 
people  have  become  a  classic,  but  to  the  listening 
multitude  they  seemed  a  prophecy.  Few  who  saw 
that  scene  ever  will  forget  it ;  and  few  who  listened 
to  the  extraordinary  harangue  of  Vice-President  John 
son  can  forget  the  amazement  and  dismay  it  caused. 
It  may  be  said  that  this  also  was  a  prophecy,  or  per 
haps  an  omen,  of  the  division  Andrew  Johnson  was, 
though  all  unwillingly,  to  bring  to  the  country.  The 
excitement  among  Republicans  over  his  appearance 
was  extreme,  and  all  manner  of  wild  ideas  were 
promulgated.  Among  the  rest,  Sumner  seriously 
proposed  to  a  senatorial  caucus  that  the  new  Vice- 
President  should  be  asked  to  resign,  and  so  weQ  in 
formed  a  writer  as  Henry  Wilson  believes  that  this 
was  the  first  and  always  rankling  cause  of  the  quarrel 
between  President  Johnson  and  the  Senator ;  clearly, 
it  must  have  had  much  influence.  It  further  certifies 


CLOSE    OF  THE    WAR.  215 

also  to  Stunner's  own  position  as  regards  the  man 
he  once  admired. 

Before  the  month  of  March  was  over,  our  successes 
made  it  evident  that  the  war  was  ending.  Lincoln 
went  down  to  Fortress  Monroe  for  a  visit  to  head 
quarters,  and  on  this  trip  Sumner  was  for  a  part  of  the 
time  his  guest.  A  few  weeks  more,  and  Lee  had  been 
driven  from  Richmond,  and  the  city  was  ours.  What 
writer  of  melodrama  could  have  invented  effects  more 
startling  for  the  crisis  of  the  great  drama  of  the  war 
than  actually  happened  ?  —  Richmond,  the  capital 
and  centre  of  the  slaveholding  empire,  at  the  end 
of  its  fearful  struggle  of  four  long  years  was  de 
serted  and  left  to  its  fate  by  the  government  it  had 
upheld,  pillaged  and  fired  by  its  own  soldiers,  and 
saved  and  protected  by  a  regiment  of  its  conquerors, 
—  a  regiment  of  negro  cavalry.  Verily,  as  those  men 
rode  down  the  familiar  streets  of  that  city  a  great 
triumph  was  theirs.  No  prophet  of  old  could  have 
so  emphasized  the  result.  Two  days  later,  the  head 
of  the  nation  it  sought  to  destroy,  the  commander-in- 
chief  of  the  armies  which  had  conquered  the  Confed 
eracy,  entered  its  late  capital  on  foot  with  only  an 
improvised  guard,  and,  almost  unattended  at  first,  lost 
or  found  his  way  through  its  streets,  until,  surrounded 
by  a  gathering  crowd  of  the  negroes  he  had  trans 
formed  from  chattels  into  men,  he  rested  in  the 
house  which  had  been  the  Executive  Mansion  of  his 
enemies. 

Surely  history  records  no  more  dramatic  incidents 
than  these.  But  this  visit  of  President  Lincoln  to 
Richmond  had  results  far  more  important  than  pic- 


216  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

turesque,  which  became  a  part  of  the  gathering  influ 
ences  that  moulded  our  history.  While  there,  per 
suaded  by  what  he  saw  and  heard  and  thought  he 
discovered  of  willing  minds  on  the  part  of  some  at  least 
of  the  Southern  leaders,  he  issued  his  confidential  invi 
tation  to  the  members  of  the  late  Confederate  Legis 
lature  of  Virginia  to  assemble  at  Richmond.  There  is 
no  doubt  for  what  purpose  this  was  done,  or  what  he 
hoped,  —  that  he  desired  them  to  withdraw  the  troops 
of  Virginia  from  the  field,  and  that  he  hoped  they 
would  officially,  and  according  to  their  own  views  of 
state  sovereignty,  return  to  the  Union ;  but  there  is 
much  difference  of  opinion,  based  too  upon  his  own 
differing  utterances,  as  to  why  he  did  this.  In  the 
light  of  what  was  then  the  uncertain  future,  but  is 
now  the  open  book  of  the  past,  it  is  claimed  that  this 
was  a  military  measure  only.  It  was  believed  at  the 
time  that  it  was  the  result  of  Lincoln's  too  ready  con 
fidence  in  the  good  faith  of  the  surrender,  and  grew 
out  of  his  theory  that  the  states  were  still  in  the 
Union,  and  a  constituent  part  of  it.  If  they  were 
no  longer  in  a  state  of  war,  he,  as  President,  could 
no  longer  manage  their  internal  affairs.  When  the 
"Committee  on  the  Conduct  of  the  War,"  — that 
committee  which  by  turns  helped  and  hindered  our 
affairs,  —  when  this  committee,  among  whose  party 
were  two  colleagues  of  Senator  Sumner,  reached 
Richmond  just  after  Lincoln's  visit,  they  discovered 
this  project  of  the  reassembling  of  the  Legislature, 
and  comprehending  the  real  situation  more  truly 
than  Lincoln,  were  justly  alarmed.  Their  report  so 
excited  Washington  and  the  North  that  Lincoln,  ever 


CLOSE   OF  THE    WAR.  217 

watchful  not  to  go  beyond  the  steps  of  the  people, 
and,  above  all,  himself  already  satisfied  that  the  effort 
was  not  .received  in  Virginia  in  the  spirit  he  had 
expected,  withdrew  his  permission.  Stunner  had 
frequent  consultations  with  him  over  the  situation, 
which  seemed  to  the  Senator  especially  alarming,  and 
it  is  claimed  that  the  result  was  due  to  him  alone, 
but  in  fact  his  was  only  one  of  many  influences 
which  together  changed  the  mind  of  Lincoln  as  to 
the  expediency  of  the  measure.  This  vain  experi 
ment  was  hardly  over  .before  the  surrender  at  Appo- 
mattox  brought  the  real  end  of  the  war ;  and  five 
days  later  Abraham  Lincoln  was  shot  in  Washington 
on  the  evening  of  Good  Friday,  and  the  very  day 
when  at  Charleston,  Gen.  Robert  J.  Anderson  raised 
again  the  stars  and  stripes  over  Fort  Sumter  amid 
dignified  ceremonial  and  military  rejoicing.  No 
words  ever  can  relate  the  horror  of  that  night  in 
Washington.  Lincoln  murdered  and  dying,  Seward 
and  half  his  household  attacked  and  apparently  dy 
ing  also,  a  terrific  storm  of  thunder  and  lightning 
hung  over  the  city  like  a  portent,  and  the  black  night 
seemed  to  cover  a  great  conspiracy.  Rumour  speed 
ily  stirred  the  government  and  the  city  to  believe 
that  Grant  and  Stanton  and  Sumner  were  marked  for 
death.  In  the  case  of  Sumner,  circumstances  gave 
colour  to  the  feeling.  Immediately  upon  hearing  of 
the  assassination,  he  went  first  to  the  White  House, 
and  then  with  Robert  Lincoln  to  the  bedside  of  the 
President,  where  with  the  others  he  watched  and 
waited  for  the  end.  Those  two  Massachusetts  con 
gressmen  who  had  just  been  to  Richmond  were  in 


218  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

Washington  on  their  journey  home,  and,  much  travel- 
stained,  appeared  at  Sumner's  door,  where,  with  the 
familiarity  of  long  habit,  they  walked  directly  into 
the  boarding-house  and  knocked  at  his  door.  Not 
finding  him,  they  made  anxious  inquiries  of  the  ser 
vant  and  left  for  an  equally  fruitless  call  at  the  White 
House  as  the  clock  struck  ten.  Fifteen  minutes  later 
they  heard  the  appalling  news.  It  is  hardly  surpris 
ing  that  the  late  hour,  their  general  appearance,  and 
their  somewhat  unusual  proceedings  should  have 
caused  a  story  long  believed  all  over  the  country, 
that  Senator  Sumner  was  also  attacked.  To  Mr. 
Dawes  and  Mr.  Gooch  themselves,  this  incident  of 
an  awful  night  was  so  trifling  that  some  time  elapsed 
before  they  realized  that  it  was  the  explanation  of 
this  common  report.  In  fact,  however,  the  visit  of 
those  two  most  modest  and  respectable  gentlemen 
was  the  only  attack  upon  Sumner;  yet  it  was  not 
without  reason  that  the  government  stationed  a  guard 
before  the  door  of  the  great  anti-slavery  champion, 
most  hated  of  all  the  Northern  statesmen  as  he  was. 
No  one  could  tell  where  those  mysterious  and  dread 
ful  blows  would  fall  next,  nor  from  whom  they  pro 
ceeded.  It  marks  the  extent  of  the  distrust  of 
Johnson  that  many  men  believed  him  the  inspirer  of 
the  plot.  One  of  our  very  foremost  public  men, 
whose  opportunities  for  judgment  were  unusual,  still 
declares  that  he  could  convince  a  jury  of  the  truth  of 
that  belief.  Nevertheless,  time  and  investigation  have 
cleared  Johnson  of  such  suspicions.  The  fact  that 
they  were  then  rife,  however,  was  one  more  source  of 
the  great  stream  of  prejudice  which  soon  gathered  so 
rapidly. 


SUMNER  AND  JOHNSON.  219 

But  at  the  beginning,  plenty  of  men  —  the  major 
ity  perhaps  at  first  —  were  of  quite  another  opinion. 
Senator  Benjamin  Wade,  who  at  Richmond  had  dis 
covered  Lincoln's  pacific  intent,  was  the  spokesman 
of  this  feeling.  The  new  President  took  his  oath  of 
office  at  the  Kirkwood  House  the  morning  after  the 
assassination,  in  the  midst  of  a  sorrowful  group  of 
Cabinet  ministers  and  senators;  and  at  once  such 
public  men  as  were  in  the  city  gathered  in  a  sad  and 
gloomy  fashion  to  greet  him  as  now  their  responsible 
chief.  Among  the  rest  went  Mr.  Wade  and  Mr. 
Dawes;  and  Wade,  on  greeting  the  new  President, 
said,  "  Mr.  Johnson,  I  thank  God  that  you  are  here. 
Lincoln  had  too  much  of  the  milk  of  human  kind 
ness  to  deal  with  these  damned  rebels.  Now  they 
will  be  dealt  with  according  to  their  deserts,"  —  a 
sentiment  he  seems  to  have  repeated  to  Mr.  Johnson 
in  more  than  one  form  and  on  other  occasions. 
Then,  as  to  all  such  utterances,  Johnson  responded 
with  sympathetic  eagerness ;  but  when  the  more  con 
servative  men  addressed  the  new  President,  he  was 
slow  in  reply,  and  especially  did  it  seem  to  their  sore 
hearts  that  he  carefully  omitted  to  praise  the  great 
dead.  Sumner  was  on  the  whole  well  satisfied,  for 
his  first  distrust  had  given  way  before  the  warmth 
of  Mr.  Johnson's  utterances.  On  questions  of  policy 
he  believed  himself  now,  as  at  the  time  of  the  Bal 
timore  convention,  in  full  sympathy  with  the  new 
President,  who  constantly  assured  him  of  their  en 
tire  agreement ;  and  he  rejoiced  that  our  distracted 
affairs  were  to  be  administered  by  this  policy, 
which  commended  itself  to  him  as  far  above  that 


220  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

of  Lincoln  in  wisdom.  Indeed,  on  one  occasion, 
such  was  the  strength  of  Johnson's  assurance  that  he 
should  assert  his  power  for  upholding  equal  rights, 
that  the  Senator  afterward  declared  in  a  public  speech, 
"  As  I  walked  away  that  evening,  the  battle  of  my 
life  seemed  ended,  while  the  Republic  rose  before 
me,  refulgent  in  the  blaze  of  assured  freedom,  an 
example  to  the  nations." 

The  pageant  of  Lincoln's  funeral  closed  the  war 
chapter  for  the  North,  and  for  the  South  the  igno 
minious  capture  of  Jefferson  Davis  furnished  the  his 
torian  with  one  more  spectacular  contrast.  The  war 
was  over,  but  no  man  realized  the  problem  left  for  us 
to  solve.  The  contest  was  something  more  than  begun 
indeed,  but  it  was  by  no  means  ended.  A  new  stage 
was  reached,  —  that  was  all ;  but  the  end,  - —  who  shall 
yet  prophesy  when  or  how  the  day  shall  come  that 
will  lift  the  burden  which  we  must  bear  in  the  yoke 
with  our  black  brethren,  the  burden  which  it  was  the 
grand  purpose  of  Charles  Sumner's  life  to  remove  ? 


CHARACTERISTICS.  221 


CHAPTER    XX. 

PERSONAL,   SOCIAL,   AND  INTELLECTUAL  CHARACTERISTICS. 

IF  it  be  asked  what  was  Charles  Sumner's  personal 
career  during  this  period  of  public  storm  and  stress, 
it  may  be  answered  that  statesmen  of  that  time  had 
no  private  careers,  —  their  whole  lives  were  given  to 
their  country;  or  with  equal  truth  it  may  be  said 
that  it  was  the  heyday  of  his  social  success,  for  never 
since  he  entered  the  Senate  had  he  occupied  so  com 
manding  a  position  in  this  respect.  At  fifty  he  was 
in  the  very  prime  of  his  splendid  manhood ;  six 
feet  and  three  inches  in  height,  and  weighing  two 
hundred  and  twenty  pounds,  he  was  of  massive  pro 
portions.  No  one  has  described  him  in  any  words 
that  give  a  just  impression  of  his  commanding  figure, 
his  stately  presence,  the  magnificent  head,  the  effect 
which  no  enumeration  of  particulars  can  in  any  way 
reproduce.  One  who  knew  every  Congress  since 
the  day  of  Franklin  Pierce  declared  that,  taken  alto 
gether,  he  was  the  finest  specimen  of  a  man  seen 
there  since  Daniel  Webster.  The  youngest  daughter 
of  Chief- Justice  Chase,  Mrs.  Janet  Hoyt,  has  lately 
given  to  the  world  her  impressions  as  she  saw  him 
day  by  day  in  the  most  familiar  fashion,  —  impres 
sions  in  which  childish  memories  and  mature  reflec- 


222  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

tion  have  blended  into  what  may  be  called  a  portrait. 
Says  Mrs.  Hoyt,  — 

"  Mr.  Sumner  was  a  frequent  visitor  in  the  early  days 
of  the  war,  and  had  a  way  of  strolling  in  to  breakfast, 
and  remaining  for  ten  or  fifteen  minutes'  chat  afterward, 
before  my  father  left  for  the  Treasury  Department.  His 
large,  English-looking  figure  and  light  tweed  clothes  were 
in  strong  contrast  to  the  conventional  black  frock-coat 
commonly  worn  by  the  public  men  of  the  day,  as  was 
also  his  easy,  careless  way  of  lounging  over  the  sofa,  as 
he  talked,  to  Mr.  Chase's  erect  and  dignified  attitude.  He 
was  very  handsome,  as  I  remember  him.  A  description 
in  an  English  book  of  travel  gives  a  very  clear  idea  of 
his  personal  appearance.  He  is  mentioned  as  '  that  great, 
sturdy,  English-looking  man,  with  the  broad  massive 
forehead,  over  which  the  rich  mass  of  nut-brown  hair, 
plentifully  streaked  with  gray,  hangs  loosely,  with  the 
deep  blue  eyes,  and  strangely  winning  smile,  —  half 
bright,  half  full  of  sadness.  Sitting  in  his  place  in  the 
Senate,  leaning  back  in  his  chair,  with  his  head  stooping 
slightly  over  the  big  broad  chest,  and  his  hands  resting 
upon  his  crossed  legs,  he  looks,  in  dress,  attitude,  and 
air,  the  very  model  of  an  English  country  gentleman.' 

"This  is  exactly  as  I  remember  him,  attitude  and  all, 
as  he  used  to  sit  on  the  sofa  in  our  drawing-room,  talking 
over  this,  that,  and  the  other  with  my  father.  In  those 
days,  the  '  man-of-the-world  '  air  was  not  common  among 
our  representative  men.  Dignified  they  almost  unvari- 
ably  were,  and  with  a  sense  of  fitness  that  seemed  to  rise 
to  any  emergency;  but  the  ease  of  manner  and  grace 
that  comes  only  by  contact  with  the  world  at  large  were 
not  often  seen.  This  subtle  quality  in  Mr.  Sumner  made 
him  rather  different  from  the  men  I  generally  saw,  and  I 
recognized  its  charm  without  knowing  the  cause;  but 
despite  his  being  a  statesman,  a  philanthropist,  and  a 
mondain,  he  was  in  some  things  so  transparently  simple 


CHAR  A  C  TERISTICS.  223 

that  a  chit  might  read  him.  On  one  occasion  he  came 
in  hot  haste,  full  of  the  removal  of  some  petty  official  in 
Boston,  whose  appointment  he  had  recommended.  He 
was  very  earnest ;  and  his  deep,  melodious  voice  had  a 
ring  of  indignation  as  he  said  with  emphasis, '  The  country 
will  be  on  my  side,  —  the  whole  country  ! '  '  I  do  not 
think  the  country  will  care  much,  Sumner,'  said  Mr.  Chase, 
quietly,  with  ever  so  slight  a  smile.  Mr.  Sumner  quickly 
looked  up,  with  the  questioning  glance  of  a  big  school 
boy,  'Now,  don't  you  think  so?'  he  said  with  great 
simplicity,  quite  unmindful  of  the  gentle  sarcasm.  *  Now, 
you  are  wrong ;  the  country  will  be  with  me,  and  will 
support  me.'  Another  day  he  told  us  of  travelling  some 
where  in  Switzerland,  and,  at  some  little  auberge,  reading 
in  the  travellers'  book  the  names  of  many  English  gran 
dees,  —  *  all  with  titles,'  he  said  ;  *  and,'  added  Mr.  Sumner, 
with  visible  delight,  and  not  a  little  impressiveness,  *  I 
knew  every  one  of  them ! '  But  his  very  simplicity  in 
these  things  was  charming;  it  was  so  naif,  and  in  so 
great  a  man  rather  added  to  his  attractions.  .  .  .  He  had 
an  amused,  comprehensive  sort  of  surprised  look  when 
anything  struck  him  as  funny,  which  I  greatly  dreaded  to 
provoke. 

"  On  one  occasion,  on  expressing  an  unasked-for  opin 
ion,  in  what  I  fear  was  a  very  spoiled-child  fashion,  he 
turned  on  me  suddenly  with  his  blue  eyes  wide  open  and 
full  of  laughter,  and  with  simply  a  great  '  why '  in  his 
deep,  rolling  voice.  'Merely  this,  and  nothing  more;' 
but  the  sudden  interrogation  routed  me  completely,  and 
caused  immediate  flight ;  and  for  some  time  afterward  he 
never  met  me  without  beginning  with  the  same  provoking 
look  in  his  eyes,  and  calling  out  to  me  with  his  deep 
voice,  '  Well,  my  little  logician,  come,  and  give  me  your 
advice ! ' " 

Who  that  knew  Sumner  but  will  recognize  this 
picture,  —  the  splendid  presence,  the  transparent 


224  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

vanity,  the  combined  simplicity  and  culture,  all 
mixed  in  a  unique  personality?  An  instance  of  one 
of  these  qualities  was  his  pride  in  his  white  and  very 
shapely  hands ;  he  would  often  sit  in  the  Senate  and 
look  at  them,  or  wear  gloves  throughout  the  session 
for  their  protection.  This  was  as  noticeable  as  the 
bunch  of  keys  Senator  Schurz  was  always  twirling; 
and  one  of  the  best-known  society  correspondents  of 
the  day,  Mary  Clemmer  Ames,  often  spoke  of  other 
things  as  being  "  white  as  Sumner's  hands."  With 
some  point  this  same  observer  declared  that  without 
his  great  physical  force  and  thunderous  tones,  his 
oratory  would  have  lost  much  of  its  effect.  Standing 
in  characteristic  attitude,  with  left  hand  upon  his  hip, 
and  with  his  right  gesticulating  or  toying  with  an  eye 
glass;  he  would  throw  back  his  head  in  such  fashion  as 
literally  to  shake  his  heavy  locks  as  he  grew  earnest 
in  debate.  He  had  not  much  humour,  and  wit  was  in 
a  great  measure  an  unknown  tongue  to  him.  Dana 
once  said,  "  Poor  Sumner,  he  can't  take  a  joke  of  any 
kind ;  he  is  as  literal  as  a  Scotch  guideboard."  Yet 
he  would  often  enjoy  the  amusing  as  well  as  the  seri 
ous,  and  his  hearty  laugh  still  rings  in  the  ear  of  more 
than  one  of  his  companions. 

It  was  partly  his  massive  physique  which  gave 
Charles  Sumner  his  great  personal  dignity,  but  it  was 
still  more  the  natural  consequence  and  the  expression 
of  the  moral  dignity  of  his  character.  So  great  to 
him  were  moral  issues,  so  serious  a  thing  was  life, 
that  all  his  bearing  showed  this  faith.  It  is  almost  an 
impertinence  to  say  that  his  personal  character  was 
beyond  reproach.  No  man  ever  accused  him  —  in 


CHARACTERISTICS.  225 

any  heat  of  passion  —  of  venality  of  any  kind ;  his 
most  scurrilous  detractors  never  questioned  his  hon 
esty  or  his  purity ;  even  his  faults  were  the  defects  of 
his  qualities,  of  that  subtler  sort  which  belong  to 
great  natures,  and  are  born  of  high  ambitions.  In 
grained  in  his  nature  was  the  deepest  reverence  for 
all  things  divine,  and  to  him  not  the  least  divine  was 
man.  It  may  be  said  that  his  lack  of  humour  re 
moved  all  temptation  to  irreverence,  but  his  reverence 
was  deeper  seated  than  this.  It  came  from  that  ser 
vice  of  truth,  that  determination  for  duty,  that  faith 
in  God,  so  prominent  in  all  the  years  that  he  lived 
among  men ;  for  his  moral  ideals  and  his  eager  devo 
tion  to  righteousness  were  born  of  the  highest  sources. 
His  religion  was  no  less  real  because  it  was  that  of 
prophet  or  seer  rather  than  evangelist. 

The  social  side  of  life  always  filled  a  large  place 
in  Sumner's  estimate  of  his  surroundings.  He  cared 
nothing  for  gayety  in  his  later  years,  but  his  friends 
were  necessary  to  him,  and  he  did  not  count  life 
complete  without  much  of  that  social  interchange  of 
congenial  minds  which  he  so  justly  valued.  It  has 
been  truly  said  that  he  "  looked  upon  society  as  the 
best  means  of  forming  the  character  and  employing 
the  faculties  of  men."  His  summers  were  spent  here 
and  there.  While  Albert  Sumner  lived,  he  was  much 
in  New  York  or  Newport  when  Congress  was  not  in 
session  ;  but  death  had  already  swept  away  that  circle, 
and  his  brief  vacations  were  largely  given  to  Nahant 
and  the  Longfellows,  or  to  the  Furness  family  in  the 
Pennsylvania  mountains.  Sometimes  he  remained  in 
Boston  for  weeks,  but  most  often,  during  the  war, 
IS 


226  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

duty  kept  him  in  Washington  the  greater  part  of  the 
year. 

During  the  war  period  he  was  still  living  in  bachelor 
lodgings,  —  a  brilliant  and  famous  man  much  sought 
by  the  great  world,  and  thoroughly  enjoying  its  hom 
age.  To  the  general  public  he  was  probably,  as  to 
Governor  Rice  of  Massachusetts,  who  was  for  some 
time  his  associate  in  Congress,  "  a  stately  personage 
who  commanded  respect  and  admiration,  but  not  a 
man  who  particularly  called  out  sympathies  or  stirred 
affections;  "  but  those  who  properly  could  call  them 
selves  his  friends  thought  differently.  To  them  he 
was  peculiarly  a  lovable  man.  But  already  he  gath 
ered  around  him  two  circles,  —  those  who  were  con 
genial  or  whom  he  admired,  and  those  others  who 
admired  him.  To  the  latter  he  was  equally  confi 
dential  —  in  some  respects  more  so  —  than  to  the 
former,  relating  to  the  circle  at  his  feet  all  his  daily 
doings,  and  listening  well  satisfied  for  their  approval. 
Both  groups  found  him  most  companionable ;  the 
Sumner  they  knew  wore  different  aspects,  but  to  each 
in  its  own  way  he  was  a  choice  and  unusual  friend. 

Among  his  frequent  companions  were  always  to  be 
found  one  or  more  of  the  diplomatic  corps,  —  those 
rare  treasures,  the  few  cultivated  men  sent  to  exile  in 
America.  The  names  of  Baron  Gerolt,  of  Sir  Frederick 
Bruce,  of  Lord  Lyons,  of  Schleiden  and  Bertinati  come 
readily  to  mind,  but  as  many  more  were  counted  by 
Sumner  among  those  who  were  worth  the  seeking. 
While  much  in  society  of  this  quiet  but  brilliant  kind, 
he  was  not  to  be  found  in  every  house.  One  who  knew 
him  well  declares  that  it  was  his  habit  to  accept  all 


CHARACTERISTICS.  227 

invitations  immediately,  but  rarely  to  present  himself 
among  the  guests  !  The  larger  and  grander  houses 
of  the  brilliant  society  which  reigned  in  Washington 
during  the  war  saw  him  more  or  less  often,  but  in 
certain  places  his  presence  was  a  foregone  conclu 
sion.  He  might  be  found  in  the  drawing-room  of 
that  grande  dame  of  the  past  generation,  Mrs.  Ogle 
Tayloe;  and  always  after  her  appearance  at  the 
capital  he  was  part  of  the  intimate  circle  round  the 
grande  dame  of  his  own  time,  Mrs.  Charles  Francis 
Adams ;  and  he  was  rarely  absent  from  the  public 
or  more  private  festivities  of  his  dear  friend,  Senator 
Edwin  D.  Morgan.  Two  other  notable  but  hardly 
fashionable  houses  saw  him  constantly  and  without 
ceremony.  He  was  one  of  that  distinguished  and  some 
what  Bohemian  group  which  gathered  about  Count 
Gurowski  in  the  parlours  of  Mrs.  Eames ;  and  he  was 
still  more  at  home  than  anywhere  else  in  the  parlour 
of  the  beautiful  anti- slavery  pioneer  of  Washington, 
Mrs.  Johnson,  who  kept  up  the  modest  salon  he  had 
known  so  long. 

He  was  never  in  any  sense  a  ladies'  man,  and  yet 
always  fond  of  the  society  of  brilliant  women.  It 
was  said  of  him  while  a  young  lawyer  that  he  was  less 
at  ease  with  women  than  with  men,  and  understood 
them  less ;  but  in  later  years  he  much  enjoyed  their 
friendship.  It  is  true,  however,  that  these  friendships 
were  largely  confined  to  those  women  who,  like  him 
self,  were  not  so  much  idealists  as  ideal  moralists,  and 
to  those  who  were  greatly  receptive.  The  suggestive 
quality  of  a  woman's  mind  meant  little  to  him.  He 
had  something  of  the  feminine  himself  in  many  traits, 


228  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

—  such  as  the  diversity  of  his  interests,  his  wide 
rather  than  deep  knowledge,  his  dependence  on  per 
sonal  connection  to  first  bring  about  interest  in  public 
affairs,  and  his  profound  enthusiasm  and  devotion  to 
principle ;  yet  taking  him  altogether,  he  was  too 
essentially  virile  to  understand  or  much  care  for  the 
average  woman.  But  when  by  reason  of  her  earnest 
ness  or  her  brilliancy  she  stood  out  beyond  her  fel 
lows,  he  fully  enjoyed  her  society.  Nor  was  he 
altogether  proof  against  great  beauty.  To  those 
women  he  cared  for,  he  was  fond  of  showing  little 
courtesies  which  seemed  to  mean  so  much  from  a 
man  of  his  weighty  and  serious  manner.  The  wife  of 
an  old  friend,  spending  a  fortnight  in  Washington, 
received  from  him  daily  bouquets  and  drives,  and 
devoted  attention  to  her  slightest  wish.  For  these 
drives  he  regularly  prepared  topics  of  conversation, 
discoursing  of  things  interesting  to  his  companion  in 
great  detail.  Once  it  was  a  long  and  particular  de 
scription  of  a  dinner  with  Thiers,  and  again  an 
equally  circumstantial  account  of  a  visit  to  the  Duke 
of  Argyll.  He  enjoyed  the  visits  and  calls  of  those 
women  he  knew  intimately,  and  they  found  him 
"most  delightfully  good  company,"  indulging  now 
and  then,  like  other  mortals,  in  something  very  like 
gossip  of  a  friendly  sort.  He  was  sure  to  remember 
the  illness  of  his  friends,  and  pay  them  those  trifling 
attentions  so  valuable  to  weakness.  Although  chil 
dren  were  somewhat  in  awe  of  him,  a  little  farther 
on  in  life  they  found  him  a  ready  listener  and  an 
eager  helper.  A  young  girl  whom  he  knew  well  used 
often  to  meet  him  in  the  horse-cars,  and  always 


CHARACTERISTICS.  229 

improved  the  opportunity  of  talking  with  him  of  her 
reading.  He  never  seemed  too  busy  or  too  much 
occupied  to  answer  her  questions,  and  often  he  would 
send  her  articles  relating  to  their  conversations.  He 
occupied  a  part  of  one  of  the  last  Sundays  he  spent 
in  Boston  in  carefully  showing  engravings  to  the 
granddaughter  of  one  of  his  old  professors,  and  her 
chief  remembrance  of  the  famous  statesman  is  his 
"  sweet  and  gentle  manner."  In  like  fashion,  he 
entertained  two  girls  from  his  own  state  through  the 
whole  morning,  still  unforgotten,  three  days  before  his 
death,  showing  them  the  treasures  of  his  house,  and 
with  careful  and  detailed  description  giving  of  his 
great  knowledge  for  their  pleasure  and  learning. 

It  became  his  custom  to  read  his  carefully  pre 
pared  speeches,  —  though  in  truth  it  should  be  said 
that  he  delivered  his  orations  in  that  manner,  for 
there  was  nothing  of  the  colloquial  in  those  argu 
ments.  He  felt,  he  said,  that  "  a  seat  here  in  the 
Senate  is  a  lofty  pulpit  with  a  mighty  sounding-board, 
and  the  whole  widespread  people  is  the  congrega 
tion,"  and  justice  to  his  audience  and  his  subject 
required  careful  and  serious  consideration  of  the 
topic.  To  this  end  he  would  prepare  for  such 
speeches  by  nights  of  work.  It  was  his  regular  habit 
to  work  till  one  or  two  o'clock  in  the  morning,  — 
frequently  continuing  till  daylight,  —  going  through 
great  piles  of  books,  "  tearing  out  the  heart  "  of  them 
with  incredible  rapidity,  and  leaving  them  full  of  the 
marks  his  secretary  was  to  use  in  making  notes  and 
extracts.  No  labour  was  too  great  to  determine  a 
point  or  verify  a  quotation  ;  even  the  choice  of  a  word 


230  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

would  sometimes  occupy  an  hour's  time  in  searching 
for  what  he  called  its  "  adjudicated  meaning."  With 
this  nice  choice  of  words  went  another  gift  for  their 
unusual  and  striking  use.  Singular  as  it  seems,  Sum- 
ner  had  a  great  gift  as  a  maker  of  phrases;  his 
epithets  became  a  part  of  the  common  speech,  his 
phrases  were  watchwords,  the  titles  of  his  speeches 
arguments.  Thus  in  a  manner  which  in  other  men 
would  have  been  laborious,  but  which  his  extraordi 
nary  power  of  assimilation  and  digestion  made  a  light 
and  pleasant  task,  he  prepared  the  speeches  that 
invariably  followed  the  same  fashion  as  did  his  early 
orations.  He  first  built  up  an  elaborate  framework; 
then  taking  his  framework  article  by  article,  he  ex 
panded  and  elaborated  it  with  every  device  of  expla 
nation,  quotation,  and  illustration;  then  summed 
up  the  whole,  added  philosophical  reflections,  and 
brought  the  question  to  the  test  of  the  law  of  eternal 
righteousness.  As  a  rule,  his  speeches  in  the  Senate 
were  four  hours  long,  but  though  rarely  less,  they 
frequently  exceeded  that  limit.  Even  his  obituary 
orations  gave  all  the  facts  in  due  order,  and  then 
deduced  therefrom  certain  philosophical  observations. 
Having  little  imagination,  he  never  appreciated  the 
power  of  suggestion,  and  was  constantly  guilty  of  the 
rhetorical  sin  of  explaining  his  allusions,  translating 
his  quotations,  —  even  sometimes  giving  a  biography 
of  the  men  to  whom  he  referred.  Of  that  graceful 
use  of  learning  which  adopts  words  and  phrases,  and 
indirectly  recalls  to  the  reader  well-known  classics,  he 
knew  little,  —  partly  from  the  directness  of  his  mental 
temperament,  in  which,  as  has  been  said,  imagination 


CHARACTERISTICS.  231 

played  little  part,  and  partly  through  the  self- absorp 
tion,  as  marked  in  his  intellectual  temperament  as 
elsewhere,  which  caused  him  to  forget  the  attain 
ments  of  other  men.  Nor  had  he  anything  of  the 
dramatic  instinct  which  gives  the  sense  of  proportion. 
He  would  spend  pages  upon  illustrations,  references 
of  but  slight  connection,  or  contemporary  history. 
Thus,  at  a  little  later  date,  a  speech  arraigning  Presi 
dent  Grant  for  what  Sumner  deemed  a  criminal  nepo 
tism  opened  with  an  account  in  much  detail  of  the 
degrees  of  nepotism  practised  by  nineteen  of  the 
popes  !  The  profusion  of  historical  detail  was  origi 
nally  due  to  a  settled  conviction  of  great  value.  A  re 
cent  German  writer  has  said  of  Bismarck  :  — 

"  Above  all,  Bismarck  devoted  himself  to  the  study  of 
history.  As  the  result  of  his  own  great  experience,  he  sub 
sequently  declared  it  to  be  his  opinion  that  a  properly  di 
rected  study  of  history  was  the  essential  foundation  of  all 
statesmanship.  History  alone,  he  said,  could  teach  us 
how  much  could  be  attained  in  negotiation  with  foreign 
powers,  and  the  highest  problem  of  diplomacy  consisted 
in  the  capacity  to  recognize  these  limits." 

It  was  with  this  conception  of  statesmanship  as  a 
science  standing  on  the  past  with  face  toward  the 
future,  that  Sumner  believed  in  the  value  of  even  the 
slightest  indication  of  the  wisdom  taught  by  expe 
rience.  It  was  but  the  peculiarity  of  his  mental 
temperament  that  caused  his  too  great  use  of  his 
learning  which  had  become  to  him  an  every- day 
possession. 

If  the  nature  and  extent  of  a  man's  learning  may 
be  discovered  by  his  range  of  illustration,  what  shall 


232  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

be  said  of  Sumner's  attainments?  His  speeches  were 
so  crowded  with  historical  and  classical  and  literary 
allusion  that  they  were  fit  to  serve  as  the  basis  of 
an  education,  in  like  fashion  as  schoolmistresses  have 
been  wont  to  do  with  the  writings  of  John  Milton. 
In  fact,  they  did  so  serve  for  one  girl,  —  the  daughter 
of  a  distinguished  scientific  man  in  Washington.  Ac 
customed  to  meet  Senator  Sumner  in  that  pleasant 
friendliness  which  he  showed  to  those  he  cared 
for,  she  conceived  for  him  the  admiration  of  hero- 
worship.  A  delicate  girl,  much  interrupted  in  regu 
lar  studies,  she  made  it  a  habit  to  hear  all  his 
speeches  and  read  all  his  addresses,  afterward  follow 
ing  out  every  reference  to  literature  and  history ;  and 
notwithstanding  the  fact  that  these  were  speeches 
which  dealt  with  the  conduct  of  a  great  war,  with 
political  issues,  and  the  problem  of  slavery,  they 
proved  so  full  of  scholarship  that  after  years  have 
shown  this  cultivated  woman  but  few  gaps  in  the 
education  based  upon  them. 

The  question  of  whether  Sumner  was  a  scholar  as 
well  as  an  orator  always  has  been  and  probably  will 
continue  to  be  much  mooted.  The  answer  must 
depend  largely  upon  the  definition  of  the  word.  His 
learning  was  certainly  wide.  Whether  his  guest  was 
a  botanist  with  whom  he  talked  of  trees,  a  pho 
tographer  who  discussed  with  him  the  latest  discov 
eries  in  the  mechanism  of  that  science,  a  learned 
professor  who  heard  from  his  lips  the  last  continental 
deliverance  on  international  law,  he  was  always  at 
home.  He  proved  equally  interested  and  interesting 
when  by  chance  he  fell  upon  a  club  of  gentlemen 


CHARACTERISTICS.  233 

farmers  met  to  discuss  the  breed  of  cattle,  or  in  an 
elaborate  discourse  to  a  lady  of  fashion  upon  the  fa 
mous  laces  of  Europe.  In  the  realm  of  letters  and  of 
learning  he  was  as  much  at  home  as  in  affairs.  All 
books  yielded  their  treasure  to  him,  and  it  may  be 
said  without  exaggeration  that  he  knew  something  of 
every  one.  Reading  everything,  light  literature  as  well 
as  that  of  value,  his  mind  rejected  what  was  trivial,  and 
stored  up  knowledge  beyond  any  power  of  estimation. 
He  had  a  passion  for  thorough  work,  and  yet  he  was 
constantly  and  curiously  inaccurate  in  much  of  his 
work,  especially  in  his  quotations.  Certainly  he  was 
a  student,  but  certainly  he  did  not  care  so  much  for 
knowledge  as  an  end  in  itself  as  for  the  use  he  could 
make  of  it.  If  only  he  is  a  scholar  who  confines  his 
knowledge  to  one  point,  and  knows  that  in  the  whole 
complete  round  of  its  connection,  then  we  cannot 
call  this  man  a  scholar ;  but  if  one  may  know  many 
things  thoroughly  and  completely,  then  this  man  also 
was  of  the  brotherhood  of  learning.  If  to  be  a 
scholar  one  must  assimilate  knowledge  and  perceive 
its  relations,  Sumner  could  not  claim  the  title.  If 
that  man  is  a  scholar  who  gathers  to  himself  and 
keeps  at  command  all  facts  and  all  knowledge,  then 
we  cannot  deny  him  that  distinction  also.  At  least, 
we  must  allow  that  few  statesmen  have  been  such 
scholars,  and  few  scholars  have  been  such  statesmen. 

That  he  was  an  orator,  no  man  disputes ;  but  in 
all  respects  he  differed  more  than  he  resembled  the 
other  eloquent  orator  whom  he  often  was  said  to  copy. 
If  he  seemed  occasionally  to  model  his  work  after 
Burke,  it  was  an  unconscious  imitation,  and  —  some- 


234  CHARLES  SUMMER. 

times  for  better,  sometimes  for  worse  —  the  result  was 
widely  apart  from  the  work  of  the  great  Englishman. 
It  is  certain  that  Sumner  admired  Burke  and  studied 
him,  but  except  in  his  early  days,  when  he  may  be  said 
to  have  passed  through  a  Burke  period,  they  never 
stood  as  teacher  and  pupil ;  rather,  they  were  like- 
minded  companions.  But  in  the  end  analysis  and 
comparison  fail ;  there  remains  only  the  unexplained 
statement  that  Sumner  possessed  in  unusual  meas 
ure  the  great  gift  of  the  orator,  —  a  genius  which  no 
critical  post-mortem  can  discover.  His  was  always 
the  moral  point  of  view,  the  high  and  lofty  ideal; 
and  this  great  aim  he  delivered  unto  men  in  stateli 
est  phrase,  and  with  all  the  glory  of  learning  and  all 
the  grace  of  culture.  Men  listened,  and  forgot  there 
could  be  too  great  wisdom,  and  forgave  too  much 
of  beauty. 


RECONSTRUCTION.  235 


CHAPTER   XXI. 

1865,  1866. 

RECONSTRUCTION.  —  SUMNER  AND  PRESIDENT  JOHNSON. 

THE    FOURTEENTH   AMENDMENT. 

THE  reconstruction  period  —  or  that  beginning  of 
reconstruction  which  is  popularly  designated  thus 
—  was  a  time  of  inextricable  confusion.  Lincoln's 
belief  that  peace  had  come  was  far  enough  from  the 
fact.  It  would  be  impossible  in  anything  less  than 
an  elaborate  and  detailed  history  accurately  to  re 
count  the  various  steps  of  the  process,  and  rarely 
possible  to  divide  them  one  from  the  other,  much 
less  to  discover  their  true  causes  or  measure  their 
results.  All  that  can  be  done  in  a  brief  sketch  is  to 
give  such  a  general  survey  —  sometimes  with  small 
regard  to  chronological  sequence  —  as  will  serve  to 
explain  the  attitude  of  the  men  who  performed  the 
task.  During  the  summer  after  Lincoln's  death,  his 
tory  made  itself  much  too  rapidly  for  any  of  the 
actors.  President  Johnson,  hardly  realizing  the  duties 
of  his  position,  and  somewhat  unduly  impressed  with 
its  powers,  settled  many  things  in  those  few  months 
for  the  country,  for  the  party  to  which  he  belonged 
and  that  to  which  he  was  gravitating,  for  his  own 
career.  He  settled  a  policy  to  which  the  more 


236  CHARLES  SUMMER. 

mistaken  it  proved  the  more  vigorously  he  clung ;  he 
"  set "  the  two  parties  in  an  irrevocable  position,  as 
a  mordant  sets  colours ;  he  determined  personal  rela 
tions  which  ended  in  impeachment  and  brought  about 
disgrace,  and  afterward  doubtless  his  death. 

By  some  mysterious  change,  never  satisfactorily 
explained,  in  three  short  months  the  fierce  hater  of 
the  South  had  become  its  ally  and  friend  ;  he  who  had 
cried  for  vengeance  had  granted  complete  amnesty ; 
and  the  man  who  was  expected  to  give  the  rebels 
their  deserts  had  turned  the  Southern  problem  over 
to  them  for  settlement.  In  May  the  President  issued 
two  proclamations,  —  one  of  general  amnesty,  and  one 
re-establishing  the  government  of  North  Carolina  ac 
cording  to  its  ante-bellum  laws  in  all  particulars ;  and 
before  July  every  Southern  state  was  in  the  process 
of  rehabilitation  along  its  old  ways.  This  went  on 
through  the  summer,  until  each  of  the  states  lately 
in  rebellion  put  in  operation  a  white  man's  govern 
ment,  and,  upheld  by  the  President,  enacted  laws 
which  carefully  restored  everything  they  had  lost  in 
battle.  Nominally  they  could  not  bring  back  slavery ; 
but  by  legal  forms  they  created  a  new  bondage  for 
the  black  man  worse  than  his  first  estate ;  for,  suffer 
ing  as  many  pains  and  penalties  as  of  old,  he  was 
deprived  of  the  care  which  personal  interest  insured 
him  in  the  day  when  he  was  only  property. 

The  South  did  not  disguise  its  triumph,  nor  the 
North  its  consternation.  Just  what  produced  this 
sudden  and  surprising  change  in  Andrew  Johnson 
never  can  be  told.  Elaine,  whose  luminous  account 
gives  a  clearer  idea  of  this  confused  period  than  any 


SUMNER   AND  PRESIDENT  JOHNSON.       237 

other  yet  written,  attributes  it  chiefly  to  the  influence 
of  Seward,  who,  when  rebellion  was  conquered  and 
slavery  gone,  returned  to  his  old  supreme  desire  for 
national  unity,  his  old  love  for  the  "Union."  But 
other  things  entered  in.  Doubtless  the  influence  of 
what  was  the  only  indication  of  Lincoln's  policy, 
his  futile  experiments  in  Louisiana  and  Virginia,  was 
strong  upon  the  new  administration.  Moreover,  those 
who  selected  Johnson  as  an  exponent  of  the  border- 
state  war  democracy  did  not  take  into  consideration 
his  personal  views ;  they  forgot  that  he  always  cared 
less  for  the  slave  than  for  the  Union,  and  did  not  re 
member  that  although  he  firmly  opposed  state  sover 
eignty,  he  held  extreme  views  of  state  rights.  Other 
and  less  statesmanlike  influences  helped  him  to  see 
matters  in  a  new  light.  It  was  a  sweeter  and  sharper 
revenge  than  death  that  the  aristocratic  rebel  leaders 
should  sue  for  pardon  at  his  hand,  —  the  hand  of  a 
despised  tailor,  almost  if  not  quite  "  white  trash."  It 
was  a  supreme  ambition  for  one  whose  career  had 
been  of  his  own  making,  to  re-create  a  new  South. 
It  was  a  blow  in  the  face  of  the  Congress  which  had 
already  differed  from  him,  to  do  it  by  executive 
order ;  it  was  especially  a  blow  to  those  senators  who 
had  impudently  called  him  to  account  for  a  misfor 
tune  which  still  mortified  him  beyond  endurance,  and 
whose  friends  had  so  unjustly  accused  him  of  com 
plicity  in  the  assassination.  These  and  other  motives, 
personal  and  public,  moved  upon  him ;  and  once 
started  in  a  course  of  his  own,  a  man  of  his  real 
power  and  peculiar  obstinacy  was  sure  to  go  further 
and  faster,  the  more  he  was  opposed.  He  was  not, 
like  Lincoln,  great  enough  to  see  and  own  a  mistake ; 


238  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

he  could  not  distinguish  between  a  war  policy  and 
one  of  peace  as  to  the  power  of  the  executive ;  and 
he  was  conspicuously  lacking  in  that  tact  which  served 
Lincoln  in  so  many  difficulties,  but  substituted  for 
it  a  most  exasperating  obstinacy.  To  understand  the 
situation  when  Congress  came  together  and  its  subse 
quent  action,  it  is  necessary  to  remember  what  manner 
of  man  he  was,  and  on  what  ground  he  acted. 

The  position  he  took  was  that  of  Seward,  —  that 
reconstruction  could  and  must  be  accomplished  alto 
gether  by  executive  action  ;  and  under  that  authority 
he  set  on  foot  the  new  governments  whose  Legislatures 
were  busily  occupied  in  securing  the  victories  their 
troops  had  lost.  This  was  a  power  Congress  had 
sharply  refused  to  Lincoln.  That  body  was  not  likely 
to  permit  its  seizure  by  Johnson,  especially  in  the  face 
of  the  use  he  had  already  made  of  it  and  the  results 
already  apparent.  Congress  took  the  position  that 
reconstruction  was  entirely  and  altogether  in  its  own 
hands,  —  a  position  the  Republican  majority  now  felt 
it  necessary  to  assume,  whatever  they  might  wish,  in 
order  to  save  their  country.  For  unless  Congress 
could  do  something  to  remedy  the  existing  state  of 
things,  the  country  had  lost  all  that  was  gained  by 
the  war,  and  was  exactly  where  it  was  in  1861,  except 
that  the  burdens  of  slavery  were  gone  and  its  advan 
tages  retained.  The  defeated  South,  by  a  sudden  and 
unexpected  turn,  was  again  in  its  old  power,  really 
and  in  fact  the  conqueror  and  not  the  conquered. 
There  is  no  parallel  case  in  history.  It  does  not 
seem  to  have  occurred  to  the  Emperor  William  im 
mediately  after  the  capitulation  of  Paris,  to  ask  Alsace 
and  Lorraine  to  dictate  the  policy  of  Germany. 


SUMNER  AND  PRESIDENT  JOHNSON.      239 

In  the  extraordinary  situation  of  affairs  Congress 
took  the  extraordinary  course  of  entirely  ignoring 
the  executive  action  during  the  summer.  This  was 
the  easier  because  the  President's  action  had  been 
nominally  tentative ;  and  upon  the  theory  that  it  was 
without  authority  and  therefore  null  and  void,  Con 
gress  took  the  reconstruction  question  entirely  into 
its  own  hands.  The  House,  by  a  most  unusual  and 
pronounced  parliamentary  procedure,  announced  its 
disregard  of  the  President's  action,  and  deliberately 
shut  its  doors  in  the  face  of  the  new  Southern  congress 
men  thronging  Washington,  —  men  who  six  months  be 
fore  were  fighting  the  very  government  of  which  they 
now  sought  to  be  a  part.  The  Senate  was  more  in 
sulting  still,  in  absolutely  ignoring  the  President  and 
all  his  ways.  On  the  very  first  day  of  the  session, 
Sumner  introduced  a  series  of  ten  measures,  cover 
ing  nearly  the  whole  ground  of  reconstruction  and 
civil  rights ;  and  as  if  nothing  had  been  done  in  that 
direction,  both  Houses  appointed  a  committee  to 
consider  and  direct  the  whole  matter.  Under  the 
guidance  of  this  committee,  from  time  to  time,  a  half- 
dozen  laws  were  passed,  vetoed,  and  promptly  passed 
again  over  the  veto.  A  rapid  glance  at  these  meas 
ures  explains  the  nature  of  the  difference  between 
the  President  and  Congress.  The  first  open  breach 
came  over  the  Civil  Rights  bill,  giving  the  negro 
the  rights  of  a  citizen  except  the  ballot.  It  was  fol 
lowed  by  the  Fourteenth  Amendment,  guaranteeing 
those  rights,,  which  the  President  could  not  veto, 
but  he  formally  disapproved  it.  The  next  important 
bill  passed  over  the  veto,  extended  the  life  and  power 


240  CHARLES  SUMMER. 

of  the  Freedman's  Bureau  for  the  better  protection  of 
the  negro.  Another  provided  a  system  of  temporary 
military  governments  for  the  states  lately  in  rebellion 
(on  the  theory  that  no  governments  existed  there)  ; 
and  still  more  radical  measures  took  away  the  power 
of  the  President  over  the  militia  in  those  states,  and 
limited  his  power  to  grant  amnesty.  Most  radical 
of  all  was  the  Tenure  of  Office  bill.  The  Congress 
which  met  March  4,  1867,  its  predecessor  having 
provided  that  there  should  be  no  interregnum,  held 
three  sessions  during  the  summer,  but  it  passed  no 
new  measures  of  importance.  At  its  regular  session 
in  December,  however,  it  inherited  the  remarkable 
result  of  the  Tenure  of  Office  act  in  the  controversy 
over  Stanton  which  finally  issued  in  the  impeachment. 
In  all  this  series  of  events  so  rapidly  summarized, 
but  occupying  more  than  two  years,  Sumner  took  a 
prominent  part ;  but  he  was  not  always  found  where  he 
was  expected.  His  first  series  of  resolutions,  offered 
in  December,  1865,  was  based  on  his  old  ground 
of  state  suicide  and  complete  power  in  Congress 
over  the  resulting  territories.  Stung  to  the  quick 
by  the  Southern  treatment  of  the  negro,  he  af 
firmed  and  upheld  the  manhood  right  of  the  black 
man  and  his  equality,  and  took  high  ground  on 
the  duty  of  repentant  rebels  to  show  their  good  faith 
honestly  by  works  meet  for  repentance.  In  form 
these  resolutions  were  largely  impracticable,  some 
thought  absurdly  so,  but  their  principles  were  the 
principles  of  patriotism  and  liberty,  for  which  Sumner 
always  contended.  These  principles  he  had  constant 
opportunity  to  put  forth  in  the  years  which  followed. 


SUMNER  AND  PRESIDENT  JOHNSON.      241 

In  many  respects  it  was  necessary  to  go  back  to  the 
past  and  repeat  arguments  men  hoped  the  war  had 
rendered  obsolete.  To  those  familiar  with  the  dila 
tory  habits  of  Congress,  it  shows  the  anxiety  and 
earnestness  of  the  time  that  great  debates  came  on 
before  the  holiday  recess.  Early  in  December,  1865, 
Sumner,  urged  to  a  white  heat  of  eloquence  by  the 
warmth  of  his  feeling,  made  a  great  speech  on  the 
Freedman's  Bureau  bill.  He  quoted  liberally  from 
every  source,  public  and  private,  to  show  the  real  con 
dition  of  the  South,  and  told  plain  truths  as  to  its 
treatment  of  the  negro.  It  was  in  this  speech  that 
he  described  President  Johnson's  message  on  the 
condition  of  the  South  by  his  well-known  phrase, 
as  a  "whitewashing"  message.  It  maybe  surmised 
that  since  this  message  was  based  on  a  rose-coloured 
report  by  General  Grant,  that  officer  did  not  forget 
the  contemptuous  epithet  in  later  days.  Sumner 
based  his  own  belief  on  the  quite  different  report 
of  Gen.  Carl  Schurz ;  and  thus  began  a  friendship 
with  Schurz  which  counted  for  more  than  any  other 
the  rest  of  his  life.  Sumner's  name  appears  con 
stantly  during  the  debate  over  these  great  questions, 
—  over  in  fact  the  one  great  question  into  which  they 
speedily  were  resolved,  whether  the  President  should 
place  the  South  again  in  the  hands  of  the  rebels,  and 
allow  them  to  work  their  will  upon  the  negro,  or 
whether  Congress  should  control  reconstruction  and 
insist  on  equal  rights.  Sumner's  was  no  doubtful 
voice.  "  Not  doubting,"  as  he  says  in  his  grand  way, 
in  the  preface  to  a  speech  delivered  at  this  time,  — 
"not  doubting  the  plenary  powers  of  Congress  to 
16 


242  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

provide  for  the  equal  rights  of  all,  political  as  well 
as  civil,"  he  strove  with  all  his  might  to  bring  the 
whole  subject  under  that  power.  Although  the  pro 
gress  of  affairs  somewhat  changed  the  occasion  of  one 
bill  after  another,  there  was  very  little  change  in  the 
real  situation,  and  indeed  very  little  progress.  It  was 
rather  a  revolution  of  affairs  round  a  single  point,  and 
such  a  fruitless  revolution  as  occurs  when  some  cog  is 
wanting  in  the  wheel  and  the  machinery  works  only 
occasionally,  or  such  crashing  as  comes  from  obstruc 
tions  in  the  machine  itself. 

This  conflict  between  the  legislative  and  the  execu 
tive,  growing  out  of  opposing  theories  as  to  how  much 
power  should  return  to  the  states  themselves,  was  an 
important  factor  in  a  change  of  the  whole  attitude  of 
our  government,  —  a  change  that,  whether  for  good 
or  evil,  is  still  going  on.  Its  nature  is  well  summarized 
by  Elaine  in  these  words  :  — 

"  Previous  to  the  civil  conflict  every  power  was  with 
held  from  the  National  government  which  could  by  any 
possibility  be  exercised  by  the  State  government.  An 
other  theory  and  another  practice  was  now  to  prevail ; 
for  it  had  been  demonstrated  to  the  thoughtful  statesmen 
who  then  controlled  the  government,  that  everything 
which  may  be  done  by  either  Nation  or  State,  may  be 
better  and  more  securely  done  by  the  Nation." 

With  this  change  of  view  Sumner  was  in  hearty  ac 
cord  ;  but  clearer-sighted  than  some  of  his  associates, 
and  more  deeply  read  in  history  than  any  of  them,  he 
saw  that  it  meant  destruction  to  democratic  govern 
ment  if  this  central  power  was  altogether  the  power  of 
the  executive.  By  that  road  come  kingdoms,  startling 


THE  FOURTEENTH  AMENDMENT.        243 

as  the  idea  may  be ;  and  while  he  believed  more  and 
more  firmly  that  power  and  its  correlative  responsibil 
ity  belonged  to  the  nation,  he  also  believed  that  the 
nation  was  its  representatives  in  Congress  assembled, 
and  that  only  thus  could  a  government  of  the  people 
be  also  a  government  by  the  people. 

In  this  particular  application  of  his  political  phi 
losophy,  he  believed  that  the  people  of  the  North 
wanted  the  negro  free,  and  he  believed  rightly ;  and 
it  was  fast  proving  itself  true  that  the  black  man  could 
be  really  free  only  under  the  protection  of  Congress. 
The  progress  of  time,  however,  showed  that  while 
Sumner  was  right  in  this  belief,  he  was  blinded  as 
to  the  real  Northern  feeling ;  it  did  indeed  want  the 
negro  "  free,"  but  it  did  not  want  him  "  equal." 
To  Sumner  and  those  with  whom  he  had  so  long 
worked,  freedom  meant  equality.  A  quotation  from 
Thomas  Hughes,  which  Sumner  afterward  used  as  a 
motto  to  his  speech  on  the  Fourteenth  Amend 
ment,  expresses  his  position :  "  Democracy  in  his 
mouth  always  meant  that  every  man  should  have 
a  share  in  the  government  of  his  country."  He 
fondly  believed  that  this  was  the  opinion  of  all  anti- 
slavery  men;  but  the  truth  was  quite  otherwise. 
Although  a  certain  momentum  gathered  from  the 
war,  and  the  necessity  for  consistency,  produced  laws 
and  even  constitutional  amendments,  establishing  the 
legal  equality  of  the  black  man,  the  North  has  shown 
itself  more  and  more  willing  to  acquiesce  in  the 
Southern  view,  that  real  equality,  civil  as  wrell  as  po 
litical,  is  undesirable.  Before  Sumner  died,  he  himself 
saw  the  development  of  this  feeling,  and  more  than 


244  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

presaged  the  conditions  which  would  come  from  it. 
But  in  the  Reconstruction  days  patriotism  was  hot, 
and  business  interests  were  only  just  beginning  to 
assert  themselves. 

Business  interests  were  a  factor,  however,  in  one  re 
sult  of  the  contest  between  the  President  and  Congress, 
—  the  reinstatement  of  party  lines.  The  fusion  of 
patriotic  men  of  all  parties  under  the  Republican  lead 
during  the  war  left  the  Democratic  ranks  for  the  time 
being  almost  entirely  to  the  Southern  sympathizers. 
These  men,  when  peace  arrived,  saw  a  new  opportunity 
in  joining  with  the  re-enfranchised  South,  and  hoped, 
not  without  reason,  for  a  return  by  this  road  to  their 
old  numerical  supremacy.  The  contest  between  the 
President  and  an  ultra-radical  Congress  gave  great 
and  unexpected  help  to  their  cause.  The  nominal 
occasion  for  it  being  a  question  of  state  rights,  many 
old  Democrats  of  conservative  tendencies  were  also 
naturally  drawn  back  into  their  original  position. 
As  the  issue  became  more  and  more  a  party  ques 
tion,  Johnson,  disappointed  that  he  could  not,  as  he 
hoped,  divide  the  Republicans,  and  driven  back  by 
them  at  every  point,  took  refuge  with  the  Democrats, 
as  did  many  other  cautious  Republicans  and  old- 
fashioned  war  Democrats.  This  again  reacted ;  and 
between  distrust  of  the  President,  concern  for  the 
results  of  the  war,  a  political  theory,  regard  for  the 
negro,  and  party  feeling,  Republicans  were  united  still 
more  closely  and  became  more  radical,  and  Sumner 
was  one  of  their  most  prominent  leaders. 

Not  that  he  was  always  in  sympathy  with  his  party. 
His  course  on  the  Fourteenth  Amendment  was  a 


THE  FOURTEENTH  AMENDMENT.        245 

great  surprise.  This  amendment,  which  gathered  up 
the  main  desires  of  Congress  and  the  country,  pro 
vides  for  a  new  definition  of  citizenship,  making  it 
include  "  all  persons  born  or  naturalized  in  the  United 
States  or  subject  to  the  jurisdiction  thereof,"  and  for 
bids  any  state  to  deprive  such  citizens  of  their  legal 
rights  ;  makes  a  new  and  equal  basis  of  representation, 
doing  away  with,  the  three-fifths  basis ;  and  expressly 
declares  that  if  any  state  shall  deny  a  man's  right  to 
vote,  it  shall  not  be  allowed  to  count  him  in  its  basis 
of  representation ;  provides  that  no  rebel  officer  may 
become  a  member  of  Congress  until  his  disabilities 
are  removed  by  Congress ;  and  in  one  and  the  same 
section  declares  the  validity  of  the  United  States  debt, 
and  repudiates  the  Confederate  debt.  This  amend 
ment  took  on  various  forms  from  time  to  time.  The 
first  bill  was  lost  by  four  or  five  votes,  among  which 
was  that  of  Sumner ;  but  it  was  immediately  taken  up 
again  in  a  different  shape,  and  in  June,  1866,  finally 
passed  as  we  now  have  it.  In  its  first  form  the 
amendment  was  particularly  obnoxious  to  Mr.  Sum 
ner,  who,  besides  his  participation  in  the  general 
debate,  made  three  set  and  formal  speeches  upon  it, 
—  the  first  filling  more  than  forty  columns  of  the 
"Congressional  Globe,"  and  occupying  two  days  in 
the  delivery.  His  position  was  that  familiar  to  his 
readers, —  that  the  Constitution  already  included  all 
possible  rights  to  all  persons,  but  such  an  amendment 
would  make  the  fatal  implication  that  it  was  neces 
sary.  Moreover,  he  held  that  to  forbid  any  state  to 
disfranchise  the  negro  implied  such  a  constitutional 
right,  which  he  would  not  allow.  His  own  explana- 


246  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

tion  of  his  position,   a  little  later,   in  a  newspaper 
letter,  was  somewhat  vague  :  — 

"  My  objection  to  the  proposed  amendment  to  the  Con 
stitution  was  twofold :  first,  that  it  carried  into  the  Con 
stitution,  by  express  words,  the  idea  of  inequality  of 
rights,  which  in  my  opinion  would  be  a  defilement  of 
the  text;  and  secondly,  that  it  lent  the  sanction  of  the 
Constitution  to  a  wholesale  disfranchisement  on  account 
of  race  or  colour.  Thus  far  nothing  of  the  kind  had  been 
allowed  to  find  place  in  its  text." 

He  went  on  to  say  that  these  were  definitely  ob 
jectionable  features.  Half  a  loaf  might  be  better 
than  no  bread ;  but  this  was  not  half  a  loaf,  but 
a  poisoned  loaf.  Feeling  as  he  did,  therefore,  he 
opposed  it  mightily.  The  magnificent  oration  with 
which  he  opened  the  debate  was  truly  enough  a 
great  speech,  even  if  it  was  not  what  it  was  more 
than  once  denominated,  "  the  greatest  speech  of  his 
life."  Feeling  more  than  he  would  acknowledge 
the  sharp  criticism  called  out  by  his  defection,  Sum- 
ner  doubtless  particularly  enjoyed  collecting  and  pre 
serving  the  commendatory  notices  of  the  press  and 
private  letters,  from  which  he  selected  thirty  pages  of 
extracts  as  an  appendix  to  this  speech  in  his  works. 
Men  compared  it  to  Curran  and  Brougham,  called  it 
the  "  New  Testament  of  the  nineteenth  century,"  de 
clared  it  second  in  importance  only  to  the  Emancipa 
tion  Proclamation,  and  all  ordinary  words  failed  them 
with  which  to  distinguish  it.  President  Johnson  took 
occasion  to  give  his  views  in  a  public  speech  wherein 
he  joined  the  names  of  Davis,  Toombs,  and  Slidell 


THE  FOURTEENTH  AMENDMENT.         247 

with  those  of  Thaddeus  Stevens,  Wendell  Phillips,  and 
Siimner,  as  equal  enemies  of  their  country,  and  in  his 
excitement  charged  them  with  desiring  his  own  assas 
sination.  The  reply  to  this  last  attack  came  from  the 
Legislature  of  Massachusetts,  which,  by  formal  resolu 
tion,  sharply  called  the  President  to  account  for  his 
attack  on  its  senator,  Charles  Sumner.  It  was  per 
haps  a  still  more  remarkable  tribute,  when  we  re 
member  its  temper  in  1850  or  in  1862,  that  the  city 
of  Boston  should  have  taken  a  similar  action. 

The  second  speech,  in  the  first  week  of  February, 
was  another  great  effort,  well  described  as  "  an  ex 
haustive  and  masterly  essay,  unfolding  and  illustrating 
the  doctrine  of  human  rights."  He  declared  the 
powers  of  Congress  to  be  ample  to  the  task  proposed 
for  four  reasons,  —  the  necessities  of  the  case  when 
states  had  "lapsed  "into  territories  through  treason; 
the  rights  of  war  still  supreme  until  fit  constitutional 
guarantees  had  been  given  ;  the  duty  imposed  by  the 
constitutional  guaranty  of  a  "  republican  form  "  of 
government,  with  a  long  and  elaborate  exposition 
from  foreign  sources  and  our  own  history  of  the 
meaning  of  that  phrase  ;  and  the  extra-sufficient  Thir 
teenth  Amendment,  which  he  declared  at  length  more 
than  covered  the  ground.  He  placed  the  "neces 
sity  "  of  the  case  alike  on  the  practical  ground  of 
humanity  and  of  national  existence,  and  on  the  high 
est  moral  grounds  of  right  and  justice.  He  laid  the 
"  duty  "  on  the  shoulders  of  Congress  in  burning  sen 
tences  and  in  sober  exposition;  and  in  elaborate 
citations  from  our  own  fathers  and  from  the  phi 
losophers,  he  showed  his  own  belief  in  the  French 


248  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

school,  and  leaned  over  to  the  great  principle  that 
liberty  implies  equality  of  rights.  He  went  on  to 
show  by  the  help  of  figures  how  far  from  any  defini 
tion  of  republican  were  the  existing  governments  of 
the  Southern  states ;  and  he  declared  that  these  gov 
ernments  existed  only  in  defiance  of  the  national 
Constitution,  and  it  was  therefore  the  duty  of  Con 
gress  to  interfere ;  and  he  expounded  the  Thirteenth 
Amendment  in  glowing  words  as  more  than  sufficient 
for  all  these  needs.  "  To  establish  the  equal  rights  of 
all,"  said  he,  "  no  further  amendment  is  needed.  The 
actual  text  is  exuberant;  "  and  in  eloquent  words  he 
pleaded  for  the  ballot  as  the  great  weapon,  the  great 
guaranty,  —  "  being  in  itself  peacemaker,  reconciler, 
schoolmaster,  and  protector."  In  the  name  of  reason 
and  gratitude,  for  the  sake  of  the  greatness  and  glory 
of  the  Republic,  in  the  name  of  humanity  itself  and 
liberty,  by  the  promise  and  the  dread  of  the  just  laws 
of  an  Almighty  God,  he  asserted  human  rights  and 
pleaded  for  equality.  The  speech  was  less  ornate 
than  most  of  such  efforts  on  his  part ;  it  was  thereby 
the  more  eloquent.  It  was  also  free  from  the  vindic 
tive  passages  which  sometimes  marred  the  effect  of  his 
words,  and  from  the  more  personal  allusions.  It  was 
all  that  Sumner's  speeches  were  wont  to  be  and  more, 
—  it  was  noble,  solemn,  grand.  After  a  score  of 
years  the  reader  yields  a  willing  assent  to  the  extrava 
gant  words  of  a  contemporary  newspaper  which  said 
of  it :  — 

"  It  is  the  most  powerful  oration  of  his  life,  the 
crowning  glory  of  his  scholarship  and  statesmanship. 
Never  yet  has  any  American  statesman  swept  so  wide 


THE  FOURTEENTH  AMENDMENT.        249 

a  range  of  learning,  so  complete  a  circle  of  public  law, 
history,  philosophy,  and  jurisprudence  in  support  of  so 
noble  a  principle  as  the  one  underlying  Republican 
government." 

It  was  little  wonder  that  the  packed  galleries, 
and  the  floor  of  the  Senate  crowded  with  congress 
men,  listened  with  rapt  and  eager  attention,  and  broke 
out  into  uncontrollable  applause  as  he  finished.  But 
great  oration  as  it  was,  its  immediate  purpose  was 
to  support  an  impossible  constitutional  interpretation, 
and  to  defeat  a  measure  for  which  in  substance,  though 
differently  phrased,  Sumner  himself  afterward  voted. 
Its  more  indirect  purpose,  that  of  a  great  plea  to 
Congress  and  the  country  for  negro  enfranchisement, 
was  accomplished. 


2$ o  CHARLES  SUMNER. 


CHAPTER   XXII. 
1866-1868. 

RECONSTRUCTION. GENERAL   LEGISLATION.  —  ALASKA. 

FAMILY    CHANGES.  —  SUMNER'S    MARRIAGE. 

RECONSTRUCTION  was  constantly  before  the  public  in 
those  years,  and  the  contest  with  the  President  took 
every  possible  form.  Charles  Sumner's  voice  was 
never  silent  when  the  actual  freedom  of  the  black 
man  was  in  question,  or  the  great  cause  of  equal 
rights  hung  in  the  balance.  It  has  been  said  that  he 
spoke  three  times  against  the  Fourteenth  Amendment. 
He  spoke  no  less  than  six  times  within  two  months 
against  the  admission  of  the  new  state  of  Colorado, 
which  offered  a  constitution  containing  the  obnoxious 
colour  qualification,  —  "  every  white  male  citizen  "  of 
suitable  age,  etc.,  was  to  be  allowed  to  vote  in  Colo 
rado  ;  so  little  was  the  logic  of  the  war  appreciated. 
Shortly  after,  that  territory  of  Nebraska  for  whose 
sake  the  Kansas- Nebraska  struggle  was  first  under 
taken  also  proposed  a  constitution  denying  the  suf 
frage  to  the  black  man,  in  whose  behalf  she  had  begun 
the  long  agony  of  the  war.  In  this  she  only  followed 
the  example  of  Kansas,  the  very  battlefield  itself; 
while  the  Republicans  of  Connecticut,  Wisconsin, 
and  Minnesota  decided  the  same  question  against  the 


RE  COArS  TR  UC  TION.  251 

negro  as  late  as  1865,  showing  how  few  of  the  anti- 
slavery  men  meant  even  political  equality  when  they 
spoke  of  freedom. 

Even  so  fierce  an  Abolitionist  as  Ben.  Wade  had 
at  last  become  converted  to  some  measure  of  state 
rights,  it  appeared,  for  it  was  under  his  auspices  that 
Nebraska  sought  admission  with  the  colour  qualifica 
tion.  But  no  political  considerations  could  move 
Sumner  when  the  great  principle  of  equality  was  at 
tacked,  and  he  was  in  no  doubt  as  to  the  definition 
of  freedom  in  America.  In  the  end  his  persistent 
opposition  was  justified  by  the  admission  of  both 
states  with  equal  suffrage  for  black  and  white  alike, 
though  Colorado  waited  ten  years  until  a  day  long 
after  Sumner's  death,  to  regain  the  lost  opportunity. 
The  experiment  of  negro  suffrage  was  tried,  however, 
in  the  District  of  Columbia, — a  measure  in  which 
Sumner  took  great  and  deserved  satisfaction,  and 
which  was,  as  he  declared  in  the  Senate,  of  "  infinite 
value  "  as  an  example  to  the  whole  country. 

It  is  impossible  to  follow  in  detail  all  the  number 
less  measures  for  the  reconstruction  of  the  nation 
which  absorbed  Sumner's  time  and  attention,  and  that 
of  his  associates ;  but  among  them  were  three  of  great 
importance,  already  alluded  to,  —  the  repeal  of  the 
Amnesty  act,  the  Reconstruction  law,  and  the  Tenure 
of  Office  act.  Sumner  believed  in  the  whole  of  them 
with  all  his  heart.  The  occasion  for  their  passage  ex 
plains  their  character.  The  amnesty  power  had  been 
misused  so  shamefully  that  these  pardons  were  openly 
sold  in  the  streets  of  Washington,  —  an  abuse  for 
which  President  Johnson  was  in  no  way  responsible, 


252  CHARLES,  SUMNER. 

but  which  necessitated  the  repeal  of  the  act.  But  a 
difference  of  opinion  as  to  the  interpretation  of  the 
repealing  bill  enabled  the  President,  in  his  temper  of 
opposition,  to  go  on  pardoning  as  before.  The  Recon 
struction  law  grew  out  of  the  general  situation,  the 
legislative  action  of  the  South,  its  freshly  disturbed 
condition,  and  the  political  relations  of  the  whole 
country.  Only  the  great  presidential  contests  ever 
created  so  much  interest  as  the  congressional  elec 
tions  of  1866,  —  for  those  votes  would  determine  the 
question  on  which  side  of  the  contest  at  Washington 
the  country  stood.  The  Southern  states  not  only  made 
laws  which  practically  re-enslaved  the  negro,  but  at  this 
time  they  began  an  organized  system  to  terrorize  him 
with  the  Kuklux  Klan.  This  secret  order  embraced 
all  the  best  blood  of  the  old  slaveholding  caste,  and 
during  full  five  years  held  the  loyal  men  of  the  South, 
black  and  white  alike,  in  absolute  terror.  Murders 
beyond  counting,  —  one  thousand  and  one  in  Loui 
siana  alone,  —  whippings  and  outrages  of  every  kind 
running  into  the  tens  of  thousands,  were  acknowl 
edged  in  sworn  testimony  of  undoubted  though  not 
uncontradicted  truth.  These  outrages  were  in  their 
green  tree  when  there  occurred  the  fearful  and  bloody 
New  Orleans  riot,  following  the  attempt  to  establish  a 
free  government  in  Louisiana.  In  such  harsh  ways 
the  eyes  of  the  North  were  opened. 

President  Johnson's  Western  tours  added  a  comic 
element,  and  four  national  conventions  added  politi 
cal  enthusiasm  to  the  excitement.  All  these  varying 
reasons  contributed  each  in  its  own  measure  to  the 
importance  of  the  crisis.  The  situation  in  the  South 


GENERAL   LEGISLATION.  253 

convinced  all  beholders  that  it  was  again  a  question 
between  rebellion  and  loyalty,  and  the  Fourteenth 
Amendment  was  made  the  shibboleth  of  decision. 
The  significant  result  of  the  election  was  a  majority  of 
three  hundred  and  ninety  thousand  against  the  Presi 
dent  in  the  North,  and  his  equally  overwhelming 
support  in  the  South.  Says  one  who  knew  well  the 
whole  situation :  — 

"The  unhappy  indication  of  the  whole  result  was  that 
President  Johnson's  policy  had  inspired  the  South  with  a 
determination  not  to  submit  to  the  legitimate  results  of 
the  war,  but  to  make  a  new  fight,  and,  if  possible,  regain 
at  the  ballot-box  the  power  they  had  lost  by  war,"  — 

a  determination,  it  may  be  said,  which  was  then 
and  for  twenty  years  afterward  constantly  affirmed 
in  Washington  in  private  conversation,  and  frequently 
heard  in  public  utterances.  Pursuing  this  policy, 
the  ten  Southern  states  who  were  then  applying  for 
representation  at  Washington,  one  after  another,  scorn 
fully  rejected  the  Fourteenth  Amendment.  The 
significance  of  this  action  lay  in  the  fact  that  to 
accept  this  amendment  was  the  condition  of  their 
admission  to  Congress.  They  had  but  to  vote  for 
that  amendment,  and  so  accept  the  result  of  the 
war,  —  not  including  negro  suffrage,  it  must  be  re 
membered,  —  and  thereby  they  became  entitled  to 
representation  in  Congress  and  full  establishment 
in  political  place  and  power.  But  President  Johnson, 
by  public  acts  and  by  much  private  correspondence, 
led  them  to  believe  that  they  might  be  admitted  with 
out  such  ratification,  under  an  executive  proclama 
tion.  The  chief  question  at  issue  was  that  of  the  basis 


254  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

of  representation,  involving  the  right  of  the  state 
to  decide  its  internal  affairs  against  the  decision  of  the 
nation.  The  claim  that  such  internal  questions  must 
be  left  to  the  state  —  the  old  claim  of  the  seceding 
states  —  was  the  ground  of  the  rejection.  Thus  osten 
sibly,  as  well  as  actually,  this  was  a  new  rebellion,  — 
a  rebellion  from  the  Southern  point  of  view  as  well  as 
from  that  of  the  nation.  Under  those  circumstances 
Congress  believed  it  necessary  to  put  the  South  again 
under  military  control,  and  in  the  Reconstruction  law 
divided  it  into  five  military  districts,  under  officers 
who  were  to  protect  all  the  citizens,  and  to  control 
affairs  until  state  conventions  knowing  no  distinctions 
of  race  or  colour,  and  excluding  unpardoned  Rebel 
officers,  should  organize  new  governments  and  ratify 
the  Fourteenth  Amendment.  Upon  doing  this,  they 
came  back  into  the  Union. 

Sumner  had  much  to  do  with  this  law,  which,  after 
considerable  discussion  and  amendment  between  the 
two  Houses,  passed  once,  and  passed  again  over  the 
veto.  A  member  of  the  committee  to  draft  the  bill, 
he  differed  widely  from  his  associates,  but  the  Repub 
lican  senators  stood  by  him  in  the  determination  to 
require  suffrage  without  distinction  of  colour.  He 
himself  has  left  this  public  record  of  his  feelings : 
"  For  Mr.  Sumner  it  was  an  occasion  of  especial  satis 
faction,  as  his  long- continued  effort  was  crowned  with 
success."  In  its  final  form,  Sumner  declared  the  law 
to  "  contain  much  that  is  good,  some  things  infinitely 
good,  but  as  coming  short  of  what  a  patriotic  Con 
gress  ought  to  supply  for  the  safety  of  the  Republic." 
Events  had  forced  Congress  to  his  position  of  control 


GENERAL  LEGISLATION.  255 

over  the  South ;  but  that  body  accepted  the  situation 
from  Lincoln's  point  of  view,  —  as  a  military  neces 
sity.  It  never  came  to  Sumner's  full  position  that  it 
was  the  duty  of  Congress  to  form  new  governments 
for  what  were  at  the  most,  and  by  Sumner's  own 
description,  only  lapsed  states. 

Following  this  severe  measure  of  reconstruction 
was  the  still  more  severe  Tenure  of  Office  act, 
which  took  from  the  President  all  power  to  remove 
the  officers  who  were  to  execute  the  laws,  and  thus  in 
his  view,  and  with  some  truth,  took  from  the  execu 
tive  branch  of  the  government  one  of  its  chief  func 
tions.  Under  it  no  removals  could  be  made  without 
the  consent  of  the  Senate,  and  appointments  during 
the  vacation  were  only  temporary  or  "  ad  interim." 
This  was  a  clumsy  measure  of  doubtful  constitutional 
ity,  and  was  accepted  by  the  more  conservative  part 
of  Congress  with  actual  though  generally  unacknowl 
edged  hesitation.  The  necessity  for  it  arose  from 
the  wholesale  removals  with  which  Johnson  supported 
his  side  of  the  contest,  and  the  various  administra 
tive  tricks  with  which  he  constantly  circumvented 
the  will  of  Congress.  From  Sumner's  constitutional 
point  of  view,  however,  there  was  no  difficulty  in 
finding  authority  for  this  measure.  As  was  so  often 
his  custom,  he  made  a  Republican  state  convention 
in  Massachusetts  the  occasion  of  a  speech  setting 
forth  the  issue  plainly  and  in  popular  form.  There  is 
perhaps  no  better  statement  of  the  congressional  posi 
tion  both  in  its  history  and  its  principles  than  in  these 
forcible  words.  Later,  in  the  Senate,  he  dealt  directly 
with  the  question  of  power ;  but  in  the  half-dozen 


256  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

speeches  of  various  lengths,  made  on  the  different 
occasions  when  the  matter  came  before  that  body,  he 
was  not  so  calm  and  considerate.  He  did  not  hesi 
tate  to  place  the  necessity  directly  on  the  character 
of  Johnson,  whom  he  described  as  a  bad  man,  a 
traitor  in  heart  and  in  deed,  the  successor  of  Jefferson 
Davis,  and  in  like  unvarnished  terms.  Throughout 
the  debate  it  is  noticeable  that  on  all  hands  the  sug 
gestion  of  impeachment  was  made  constantly,  and 
sometimes  directly.  In  the  bill  as  it  finally  passed, 
it  was  provided,  among  other  things,  that  Cabinet 
officers  should  hold  their  places  during  the  term  of 
the  President ;  and  further,  that  no  official  should  be 
removed  during  a  congressional  vacation,  but  only 
"  suspended ;  "  and  if  the  Senate  on  its  convening 
should  not  concur  in  this  action,  the  suspended  offi 
cial  thereby  resumed  his  office.  Moreover,  any  re 
moval  or  appointment  contrary  to  this  law  was  made 
a  "  high  misdemeanor." 

On  this  measure,  therefore,  hung  the  next  great 
event  in  our  national  history,  —  the  impeachment  of 
a  President.  As  if  to  prove  that  there  was  no  strain 
which  a  democracy  could  not  bear,  within  ten  years 
the  Republic  fought  two  great  contests.  The  govern 
ment  of  the  nation  fought  out  a  great  military  struggle 
with  the  people  who  made  the  government ;  and  Con 
gress,  representing  the  people,  fought  out  a  great  leg 
islative  struggle  with  the  government  of  the  people's 
own  creation.  A  popular  government  warred  with  the 
people.  A  government  by  the  people  struggled  for 
mastery  between  its  parts.  Democracy  endured  the 
strain  in  triumph.  The  nation  stood;  but  in  some 


GENERAL   LEGISLATION.  257 

respects  both  contests  were  drawn  battles.  In  the 
first  conflict  the  government  conquered  the  states, 
but  with  victory  in  its  hand  saw  the  results  of  victory 
snatched  from  under  its  feet.  In  the  second  conflict 
parliamentary  government  won  the  issue,  but  lost  the 
battle ;  while  executive  government  won  the  battle, 
but  lost  the  issue.  In  that  long  run  which  determines 
all  things,  the  South  has  gained  its  particular  demands, 
but  has  lost  its  great  principle ;  the  power  has  gone 
from  the  states  to  the  nation.  And  it  is  not  the 
Executive,  but  Congress,  that  has  gained  it. 

By  processes  and  along  roads  thoroughly  abhorrent 
to  Sumner,  we  have  reached  his  idea  of  national  con 
trol,  and  are  using  it  for  purposes  he  would  have  cast 
out  with  horror. 

Notwithstanding  all  these  sore  fightings,  these  were 
nominally  times  of  peace ;  and  Sumner  least  of  all 
his  colleagues  forgot  the  needs  and  duties  of  peace. 
Foreign  affairs  occupied  much  of  his  thoughts.  He 
lost  no  time  in  authorizing  a  minister  to  the  repub 
lic  of  Dominica,  —  afterward  so  important  a  point  in 
the  history  of  the  country  and  his  own  career.  He 
sought  to  establish  our  representatives  abroad  in  their 
due  rank  of  ambassadors,  —  a  position  refused  them 
then  and  since  by  the  pseudo-democracy  of  Congress; 
and,  somewhat  inconsistently,  he  carried  the  measure 
prohibiting  their  wearing  a  court- dress.  He  created 
the  office  of  Second  Assistant  Secretary  of  State,  in 
just  recognition  of  the  unequalled  service  of  William 
Hunter.  He  favored  the  subsidies  which  gave  us 
mails  over  the  Pacific  to  Japan  and  the  Sandwich 
Islands,  and  the  appropriation  for  the  beginning  of  a 
17 


258  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

ship-canal  through  the  Isthmus  of  Darien.  He  con 
gratulated  both  the  Old  World  and  the  New  on  the 
completion  of  the  ocean  telegraph,  and  likened  it  to 
the  discovery  of  America  ;  and  in  many  other  ways  he 
helped  to  keep  us  in  the  front  rank  of  the  nations  of 
the  world,  while  seeking  to  compose  our  disturbed  in 
ternal  affairs.  Nor  did  he  forget  other  and  perhaps 
minor  matters.  He  advocated  the  relief  of  the  Su 
preme  Court  by  the  establishment  of  a  new  supple 
mentary  court,  —  a  measure  which  it  has  taken  nearly 
twenty-five  years  of  accumulated  law  business  since 
that  time  to  bring  about.  He  found  the  Constitution 
broad  enough  to  cover  questions  of  agriculture  and 
health,  —  a  claim  of  national  power  much  derided  at  the 
time,  but  long  since  accepted  as  a  matter  of  course. 
He  proposed  the  opening  of  the  Senate-chamber  to 
the  air  of  heaven,  —  a  reform  which  unhappily  lingers 
unaccomplished.  He  formulated  and  advocated  the 
bill  which  first  authorized  the  use  of  the  metric  system 
in  the  United  States.  He  so  far  announced  himself 
in  favour  of  giving  the  ballot  to  woman  as  to  say  that 
it  was  obviously  one  of  the  great  questions  of  the  fu 
ture,  and  eventually  would  be  decided  by  the  wish  of 
woman  herself.  He  sought  to  exempt  public  libra 
ries  from  the  tariff  on  books,  and  to  reduce  the  tariff 
on  coal,  —  the  first  because  of  its  general  effect,  and 
the  second  because  of  its  effect  on  New  England. 

Among  these  and  other  measures  was  one  whose 
far-reaching  consequences  we  are  only  beginning  to 
discover,  —  the  purchase  of  Alaska.  Perhaps  none 
of  Mr.  Sumner's  orations  have  brought  him  more 
fame  than  his  speech  on  this  bill,  and  certainly  no 


ALASKA.  259 

measure  in  his  long  legislative  career  had  more  direct 
effect  on  the  development  of  the  country  than  this,  so 
widely  apart  and  entirely  disconnected  from  the  main 
work  of  his  life.  Secretary  Seward  had  conceived  the 
idea  that  by  the  purchase  of  this  territory,  then  known 
as  Russian  America,  we  should  show  our  friendship 
for  Russia,  who  alone  of  the  great  powers  had  valiantly 
stood  by  us  in  the  war ;  we  should,  as  Sumner  after 
ward  put  his  own  view  of  the  matter,  "  dismiss  another 
European  sovereign  from  our  continent,  predestined 
to  become  the  broad  undivided  home  of  the  Ameri 
can  people,"  and  we  should  gain  a  valuable  posses 
sion.  On  the  29th  of  March,  1867,  Secretary  Seward 
and  Baron  Stoeckel,  the  Russian  minister,  first  laid 
this  plan  before  Sumner,  who  was  as  eager  as 
they  for  the  result.  The  next  day  the  treaty  was 
signed.  Ten  days  later,  Sumner  made  a  speech  cov 
ering  this  hitherto  unknown  territory  as  completely  as 
if  it  had  been  the  interest  of  his  lifetime.  In  the 
more  than  twenty  years  that  we  have  been  possessed 
of  this  great  land,  we  have  discovered,  except  in  one 
or  two  particulars,  no  more  of  it  than  Sumner  told  us 
after  the  study  of  a  single  week.  As  usual  on  such 
occasions,  he  sent  to  the  Congressional  Library  for  all 
the  works  it  contained  on  this  subject,  and  his  secre 
tary  declares  that  they  came  by  the  "cart-load." 
To  these  he  added  all  the  knowledge  possessed  by 
the  Smithsonian  Institute,  either  in  printed  reports  or 
through  its  officials.  Prof.  Charles  F.  Baird,  then 
its  chief  officer,  took  much  interest  in  the  matter,  and 
gave  him  great  and  valuable  assistance.  Other  de 
partments  of  the  government  did  likewise.  Out  of  all 


2<5o  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

this  mass  of  material  in  many  languages,  Sumner  ex 
tracted  with  unerring  skill  what  he  wanted.  The 
speech  is  a  complete  review  of  the  history  of  that 
country  and  the  political  considerations  making  the 
treaty  desirable ;  it  is  an  equally  complete  review  of 
all  that  was  then  known  —  and  for  the  most  part  all 
that  is  now  known  —  of  "the  government,  popula 
tion,  climate,  vegetable  and  mineral  products,  furs, 
and  fisheries."  It  is  an  absolutely  exhaustive  survey, 
though  curiously  ^enough,  as  it  proved,  Sumner  hardly 
credited  the  "fabulous"  tales  of  the  worth  of  the  seal 
fisheries.  But  with  no  special  attention  to  those, 
which  have  already  brought  the  government  a  revenue 
of  many  million  dollars,  he  considered  it  worth,  as  a 
commercial  venture,  much  more  than  the  seven  mil 
lion  dollars  we  were  to  pay,  and  as  a  political  and  na 
tional  acquisition  of  untold  value.  In  closing,  he  sug 
gested  the  name  Alaska.  What  citizen  of  the  United 
States  to-day  but  admires  and  blesses  the  courage 
and  foresight  of  those  two  statesmen  who,  regardless 
of  the  great  war-debt  under  which  we  staggered,  se 
cured  for  us  that  magnificent  possession  ! 

During  this  brief  period  Sumner's  personal  history 
had  moved  on  with  astonishing  and  almost  spasmodic 
rapidity.  In  October,  1863,  in  the  midst  of  the 
most  doubtful  period  of  the  war,  his  brother  George 
died  in  Boston,  in  the  prime  of  his  life.  Of  all 
Charles  Sumner's  family  this  brother  had  tastes  most 
similar  to  his  own.  According  to  Baron  Humboldt, 
he  "  had  done  more  to  raise  the  literary  reputation  of 
America  abroad  than  any  other  American."  His  death 
was  no  ordinary  blow  to  the  Senator,  who  was  left 


SUMNER'S  MARRIAGE.  261 

alone  of  all  the  five  sons.  Three  years  afterward,  in 
1866,  his  mother  died.  He  was  ever  especially  de 
voted  to  her,  notwithstanding  his  long  absences,  and 
her  death  ended  for  him  the  home  in  Boston.  One 
who  knew  her  says  that  she  retained  something  of 
earlier  grace  and  beauty  to  the  last. 

"  She  was  tall  and  stately,  with  the  old-school  dignity 
of  manner ;  and  if  thought  distant,  you  soon  forgot  in  her 
genial  friendliness  and  evident  superiority  of  mind  every 
thing  except  that  she  was  one  of  the  most  admirable  of 
women." 

Somewhat  later  in  the  same  year,  Sunmer  was  mar 
ried  at  King's  Chapel,  in  Boston,  to  Alice  Mason 
Hooper,  a  niece  of  Jeremiah  Mason,  and  the  widowed 
daughter-in-law  of  Sumner's  friend  and  colleague 
Samuel  Hooper.  To  those  who  had  seen  them  together 
in  Washington  the  marriage  was  no  great  surprise,  for 
his  devotion  had  been  marked  and  somewhat  oppo 
site  to  his  usual  stately  ways.  Among  all  the  fascinat 
ing  women  of  Washington  she  stood  pre-eminent. 
Beauty,  grace,  a  slender  and  stately  form,  a  high-bred 
manner,  and  aristocratic  reserve  were  all  hers,  and 
withal  a  special  fascination,  coming  perhaps  from  the 
uncertain  moods  of  an  extremely  variable  temper, — 
a  temper  which  would  pay  its  debts  in  the  small  coin 
of  teasing  or  in  the  grand  style,  as  fitted  the  mood  of 
the  hour.  There  was  something  of  the  spoiled  child 
about  her ;  there  were  all  the  characteristics  of  a  so 
ciety  belle  who  is  also  a  beauty,  and  there  were  other 
most  feminine  qualities.  Rarely  have  two  persons 
seemed  to  combine  more  of  honours  and  graces  ;  rarely 
were  two  persons  so  little  suited  to  each  other  in 


262  CHARLES  SUMA'EX. 

reality.  Fascination  and  hope  on  the  one  side,  fas 
cination  and  ambition  on  the  other,  brought  about  the 
union.  There  was  no  need  to  question  that  Sumner 
found  himself  "  in  love  "  at  last,  nor  much  need  to 
doubt  the  testimony  of  Mrs.  Hooper's  manner  and 
blush  when  she  spoke  of  him.  But  he  was  fifty-seven, 
a  scholar,  with  the  peculiar  temperament  already  noted, 
and  the  bachelor  habits  of  a  lifetime,  longing  for  the 
comfort  and  dignity  of  the  home  of  which  he  dreamed. 
She  was  twenty- seven,  with  her  own  strange  tempera 
ment  and  the  habits  at  once  of  a  belle  and  a  spoiled 
child,  looking  fonvard  eagerly  to  the  new  gayeties  of 
a  senator's  wife,  and  contemplating  a  near  future  when 
she  should  be  mistress  of  the  White  House. 

A  curious  incident  brought  about  their  housekeep 
ing.  Sumner's  friend,  Senator  Pomeroy,  of  Kansas, 
had  but  lately  married,  and  he  often  dined  at  their 
house  in  the  pleasant  familiarity  of  the  family  table. 
On  Sumner's  expressing  a  sort  of  covetousness  one 
day,  Mr.  Pomeroy  said  to  him,  "  Sumner,  if  you  will 
marry,  you  can  have  this  house."  To  the  astonish 
ment  of  Mr.  Pomeroy,  not  long  afterward  he  was 
called  upon  to  redeem  the  promise ;  and  with  the 
profound  devotion  to  Sumner  usual  among  his  ad 
mirers,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Pomeroy  moved  out  of  the 
house  that  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Sumner  might  come  in. 
It  was  not  altogether  suited  to  the  Senator's  needs, 
however,  and  his  wife  objected  that  it  was  incon 
venient  for  the  cotillion.  Sumner,  under  the  ad 
vice  of  Samuel  Hooper,  had  already  contracted  for 
the  corner  house  of  a  block  of  three,  another  of 
which  Senator  Pomeroy  had  taken,  There  was  much 


SUMNER'S  MARRIAGE.  263 

discussion  over  the  new  house,  and  Sumner's  care 
for  domestic  details  and  interest  in  them  was  re 
marked.  The  winter  that  followed  his  marriage 
was  a  very  gay  one,  but  sometimes  happy  and 
sometimes  discordant ;  and  before  it  was  entirely 
over,  Charles  Sumner's  brief  married  life  was  at  an 
end.  Sumner  believed  himself  to  have  suffered  a 
great  and  irreparable  wrong ;  Mrs.  Sumner  believed 
herself  unjustly,  and  therefore  cruelly,  treated.  The 
relations  between  them  were  so  strained  that  neither 
explanation  nor  forgiveness  was  possible;  and  al 
though  there  were  outside  attempts  to  bring  about  a 
reconciliation  on  the  basis  of  forgetting,  Sumner 
would  have  nothing  to  do  with  those.  It  is  said  that 
even  in  the  most  familiar  intercourse  he  never  spoke 
his  wife's  name  again,  alluding  to  her,  if  necessary, 
in  a  laconic  manner  as  "  that  person."  But  with  a 
chivalry  little  appreciated  then  or  since,  he  resolutely 
refused,  albeit  under  such  bitter  provocation  as  cut 
him  to  the  quick,  to  give  the  world  the  belief  which 
was  an  entirely  sufficient  reason  for  his  action,  and 
quietly  accepted  the  interpretation  that  laid  the  sepa 
ration  at  the  door  of  his  own  temper.  Whether  right 
or  wrong  in  fact,  from  his  standpoint  Sumner's  was 
a  knightly  course  under  a  severer  ordeal  than  men  are 
wont  to  suffer.  How  sore  was  the  trial,  was  evident 
in  the  gloom  and  despondency  that  hung  over  him. 
Long  after,  he  confessed  to  a  friend  that  "  thoughts 
of  suicide  haunted  him,  and  then  visions  of  with 
drawing  from  the  world  and  burying  himself  in  some 
lonely  chalet  amid  Swiss  mountains."  But  to  en 
dure  had  become  a  second  nature  with  him,  and  he 


264  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

quenched  trouble  as  he  had  smothered  pain,  with  the 
mingled  draught  of  duty  and  ambition,  and  pursued 
his  way.  Six  years  later,  a  divorce  was  quietly 
granted,  —  but  according  to  current  rumour,  not 
until  a  bill  had  been  passed  by  the  Legislature  of 
Massachusetts  greatly  softening  the  stringency  of  the 
divorce  laws  in  that  state. 

During  the  long  public  and  personal  strain  upon 
him  in  the  summer  of  1867,  Sumner  gave  up  the 
house  in  Boston  which  had  been  his  father's  before 
him,  and  sadly  enough  declared  that  now  he  had 
no  home.  But  a  few  months  later,  in  January  of  the 
next  year,  he  moved  into  the  new  house  to  which  he 
had  once  looked  forward  so  eagerly,  and  which  for 
the  rest  of  his  life  was  so  much  to  him.  Indeed,  so 
characteristic  an  expression  of  himself  did  he  make 
it,  that,  although  he  lived  in  it  for  only  six  years  of 
his  life,  it  is  to  most  persons  the  frame  of  the  picture 
whenever  they  think  of  Charles  Sumner  throughout 
his  long  career. 


IMPEACHMENT  OF  JOHNSON.  265 


CHAPTER  xxm. 

1868. 

THE   IMPEACHMENT  OF  PRESIDENT   JOHNSON. 

THE  opening  of  Congress  in  December,  1867,  was 
the  signal  for  the  renewal  of  the  conflict  between  the 
President  and  Congress.  Immediately  after  the  close 
of  the  preceding  session,  the  President  requested  the 
resignation  of  Stanton  as  Secretary  of  War,  and  pre 
cipitated  the  contest  which  was  the  occasion  of  the 
impeachment.  Stanton's  refusal  grew  out  of  his  firm 
belief  that  public  duty  required  this  sacrifice  of  dig 
nity.  His  suspension  and  the  temporary  incumbency 
of  General  Grant  were  the  events  of  the  summer,  and 
Congress  was  confronted  with  the  question  immedi 
ately  upon  its  assembling.  It  was  a  foregone  conclu 
sion  that  the  Senate  should  reinstate  the  Secretary,  and 
equally  to  be  expected  that  the  President  should  join 
the  issue  by  his  peremptory  removal.  When  Stanton 
refused  to  vacate  the  War  Office  to  the  President's 
"  ad  interim  "  secretary,  Gen.  Lorenzo  Thomas,  but 
waited  for  the  Senate's  confirmation  of  a  perma 
nent  officer,  and  for  the  second  *  time  disputed  the 
President's  authority,  he  divided  the  public  into  two 
camps,  —  those  who  looked  with  horror  at  the  insult 
to  the  throne,  and  considered  Stanton  a  usurper,  and 


266  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

those  who  hailed  his  courageous  action  as  a  new  sal 
vation  of  the  country.  Sumner  held  the  latter  view. 
In  a  widely  copied  message  from  the  Senate-chamber 
to  the  castle  in  the  War  Department,  he  expressed 
himself  in  the  laconic  fashion  peculiar  to  his  private 
notes :  — 
My  DEAR  STANTON,  —  STICK  \ 

Ever  sincerely  yours, 

C.  S. 

In  the  temper  of  Congress  the  effect  of  this  contro 
versy  was  never  doubtful.  The  House  of  Representa 
tives,  in  a  haste  and  excitement  unpardonable  and 
almost  indecent,  impeached  the  President  of  high 
crimes  and  misdemeanors  on  eleven  counts,  of 
which  the  most  important  concerned  his  treatment 
of  Stanton,  and  his  characterization  of  Congress  as 
an  illegal  body. 

The  controversy  that  thus  came  to  its  climax  had 
many  significant  features,  while  even  its  details  did 
much  to  influence  the  result.  The  impeachment  itself 
was  the  final  success  of  a  persistent  effort  for  more 
than  the  year  previous.  The  removal  of  Stanton  was 
the  last  of  a  series  of  removals,  and  gained  a  special 
meaning  in  the  light  of  the  whole.  The  appointment 
and  retirement  of  Grant  had  a  political  significance  as 
well  as  a  governmental  one,  and  produced  on  the 
one  side  a  bitter  quarrel  between  him  and  the  Presi 
dent,  and  on  the  other  added  to  the  radical  distrust  of 
Grant.  There  were  those  who  believed  Johnson's 
action  a  part  of  a  plot  to  make  himself  President 
again  at  any  cost.  But  notwithstanding  these  facts 
and  half-avowed  beliefs,  the  high-handed  action  of 


IMPEACHMENT  OF  JOHNSON.  267 

Congress,  its  hasty  and  ill-considered  behaviour,  were 
altogether  indefensible  on  any  ground  except  that  of 
a  necessity  greater  than  ever  has  appeared.  In  the 
calmer  light  of  history  the  occasion  seems  awfully  in 
adequate  to  the  grave  remedy  of  an  impeachment,  and 
the  whole  contest  like  a  duel  between  two  parts  of  a 
government.  But  in  so  severe  a  judgment  it  must  be 
remembered  that,  at  the  time,  it  appeared  a  great  crisis 
to  both  sides.  Men  had  not  forgotten  that  excuses 
and  over-confidence  allowed  the  war  to  spring  upon 
us  unsuspecting ;  and  statesmen  who  had  helped  to 
save  the  countiy  had  reason  to  be  over-sensitive  when 
they  thought  the  result  of  the  war  imperilled.  Nor 
can  we  tell  to-day  how  much  the  impeachment  ac 
complished  as  an  obstacle  to  a  centralizing  tendency. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  its  failure  was  a  fortunate 
thing  ;  but  it  was  a  sharp  lesson,  and  for  the  brief  re 
mainder  of  that  administration  there  was  quiet.  As  a 
historical  event  it  was  a  great  spectacle.  The  very 
simplicity  of  the  occasion  when  the  Senate  assembled 
as  a  court  of  judgment,  presided  over  by  the  Chief- 
Justice,  and  listened  day  after  day  to  the  arguments 
of  the  great  lawyers  on  both  sides,  was  an  object  les 
son  in  democratic  institutions.  Not  brilliant,  like  the 
great  trial  of  Warren  Hastings,  it  was  incomparably 
greater  in  importance,  for  it  was  the  head  of  a  nation 
who  was  on  trial.  It  was  the  peaceful  revolution  of  a 
democracy.  Only  those  who  felt  it  ever  can  realize 
the  excitement  of  its  progress  or  the  tension  of  the 
uncertainty  as  it  drew  near  the  end.  The  prosecution 
needed  only  one  vote  for  success,  and  the  courage 
of  the  seven  Republican  senators  who  voted  "  not 


268  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

guilty"  never  has  received  the  high  appreciation  it 
deserved.  In  so  close  a  contest  the  incidental  ques 
tions  were  of  great  importance,  and  on  these  points 
Sumner's  learning  and  familiarity  with  Old  World  pre 
cedents  were  very  valuable.  His  personal  independ 
ence  was  shown  in  his  opposition  to  the  right  of  the 
Chief- Justice  to  rule  or  vote,  when  in  a  most  learned 
speech  he  controverted  the  opinion  and  obstructed 
the  wish  of  his  old  friend  and  customary  associate, 
Mr.  Chase. 

His  "  opinion  "  —  the  speech  in  which  he  set  forth 
his  position  —  adequately  represented  his  reasons  for 
favouring  impeachment.  He  began  with  an  epitome 
of  the  situation  which  summed  up  in  terrific  fashion 
his  view  of  the  President's  course.  Said  he  :  — 

"  This  is  one  of  the  last  great  battles  with  Slavery. 
Driven  from  these  legislative  chambers,  driven  from  the 
field  of  war,  this  monstrous  power  has  found  refuge  in 
the  Executive  Mansion,  where,  in  utter  disregard  of 
Constitution  and  law,  it  seeks  to  exercise  its  ancient 
domineering  sway.  All  this  is  very  plain.  Nobody  can 
question  it.  Andrew  Johnson  is  the  impersonation  of 
the  tyrannical  Slave  Power.  In  him  it  lives  again.  He 
is  lineal  successor  of  John  C.  Calhoun  and  Jefferson 
Davis ;  and  he  gathers  about  him  the  same  supporters. 
Original  partisans  of  Slavery,  North  and  South,  habitual 
compromisers  of  great  principles,  maligners  of  the 
Declaration  of  Independence,  politicians  without  heart, 
lawyers  for  whom  a  technicality  is  everything,  and  a 
promiscuous  company  who  at  every  stage  of  the  battle 
have  set  their  faces  against  Equal  Rights,  —  these  are  his 
allies.  It  is  the  old  troop  of  Slavery,  with  a  few  recruits, 
ready  as  of  old  for  violence,  cunning  in  device,  and 
heartless  in  quibble.  With  the  President  at  their  head, 


IMPEACHMENT  OF  JOHNSON.  269 

they  are  now  intrenched  in  the  Executive  Mansion.  .  .  . 
Not  to  dislodge  them  is  to  leave  the  Country  a  prey  to 
a  most  hateful  tyranny ;  especially  is  it  to  surrender  the 
Unionists  of  the  Rebel  States  to  violence  and  bloodshed. 
Not  a  month,  not  a  week,  not  a  day,  should  be  lost.  The 
safety  of  the  Republic  requires  action  at  once.  Innocent 
men  must  be  rescued  from  the  sacrifice." 

Yet  he  proceeded  to  say  that  he  "  would  not  de 
part  from  the  moderation  proper  to  the  occasion  "  ! 
With  no  less  force  and  —  shall  it  be  said?  —  fury, 
he  gave  the  particulars  of  the  count  in  much  detail, 
"  showing  how  this  proceeding  is  political  in  charac 
ter,  before  a  political  body,  and  with  a  political  judg 
ment," —  using  the  word  "political"  in  its  original 
and  strict  sense,  and  not  according  to  its  misleading 
modern  use.  He  then  dealt  with  the  transgressions  of 
the  President  in  protracted  line,  explaining  how  they 
are  embraced  under  impeachable  offences,  and  after 
some  attention  to  the  legal  questions  involved,  passed 
to  consider  the  testimony.  He  took  up  each  point 
learnedly  or  particularly  according  to  its  nature,  in 
many  cases  replying  completely  to  the  arguments  of 
Curtis,  Evarts,  and  others  in  behalf  of  the  President. 
The  student  of  history  will  do  well  to  read  the  terrible 
arraignment  before  determining  the  case  between  the 
President  and  Congress,  or  deciding  upon  the  neces 
sity  for  impeachment,  remembering  meanwhile  that 
in  this  arraignment  none  of  the  counts  can  be  denied, 
whatever  opinion  may  be  held  of  the  underlying  rea 
sons  or  the  policy  indicated. 

In  its  constitutional  aspect,  Sumner's  "  opinion " 
emphasized  a  point  of  view  which  had  become  his 


270  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

theory  of  action.  It  grew  out  of  high  moral  instincts 
indeed,  and  was  at  first  but  a  tendency  ;  but  it  had  be 
come  a  fixed  philosophy,  as  really  pernicious  as  at 
first  sight  it  appeared  to  be  noble.  He  had  come  to 
feel  that  everywhere  and  in  all  things  law  must  yield 
to  principle.  A  few  illustrations  will  show  the  danger 
ous  nature  of  this  philosophy.  Beginning  with  his 
position  that  the  Constitution  did  not  sanction  slavery, 
he  speedily  held  that  this  omission  came  from  the  fact 
that  the  right  to  freedom  was  a  higher  right  than  those 
given  by  the  Constitution.  Very  soon  he  believed  that 
the  Declaration  of  Independence  was  the  highest  law  of 
the  land,  and  the  United  States  was  not  bound  by  the 
Constitution  except  in  so  far  as  it  agreed  with  the 
Declaration  of  Independence.  He  next  concluded 
that  Congress  had  supreme  power  over  the  "  lapsed 
states  "  because  the  good  of  the  country  required  it, 
and  equal  rights  were  to  be  granted  as  a  right  that 
transcended  law.  And  his  speech  on  impeachment  is 
full  of  scorn  and  contumely  for  those  who  believed 
that  it  must  be  decided  on  the  question  of  "  law,"  — 
"  technicalities  and  quibbles,"  as  he  asserted ;  for 
Andrew  Johnson  had,  he  declared,  conspired  against 
the  nation  itself,  —  an  offence  above  and  beyond  law, 
and  dealing  with  principles  of  national  life,  not  the 
keeping  or  breaking  of  the  nation's  statutes.  How 
specious  and  how  dangerous  such  a  view  becomes,  is 
seen  in  these  illustrations.  Its  weakness  and  its  dan 
ger  appeared  still  more  strongly  a  little  later  on,  when 
other  men  could  not  understand,  much  less  agree  to, 
such  a  philosophy. 

Many  things  contributed  to  persuade  the  Republi- 


IMPEACHMENT  OF  JOHNSON.  271 

can  senators  who  voted  "not  guilty"  to  the  course  they 
adopted.  Among  other  influences,  strong  upon  some 
men,  were  the  changes  it  would  bring  about.  To  put 
Benjamin  Wade  (the  President  of  the  Senate)  into 
the  White  House  was  the  chief  end  of  the  whole 
matter  to  some,  notably  to  certain  congressmen.  With 
others,  to  keep  the  country  out  of  his  hands  was  a 
quite  sufficient  reason  for  leaving  Andrew  Johnson 
there.  Rumour  was  busy  with  further  changes  also. 
Regarding  the  impeachment  as  certain  to  result  in 
conviction,  various  slates  were  proposed  for  President 
Wade's  Cabinet.  One  made  Benjamin  Butler  its  chief 
member ;  another  gave  the  place  of  Secretary  of  State 
to  Sumner.  It  is  beyond  question  that  the  fear  of  one 
or  the  other  of  these  results,  equally  undesirable  to 
many  minds,  had  no  little  influence  at  important 
crises  in  the  trial.  To  Sumner  the  acquittal  was  a 
great  disappointment,  and  seemed  a  national  calamity 
hard  to  measure.  He  felt  that  Stanton's  resignation, 
which  followed  immediately  as  a  matter  of  course,  left 
the  country  in  the  hands  of  traitors  again.  The  bit 
terness  of  the  attack  from  every  side  upon  three  of 
the  senators  who  voted  for  the  President  —  Sen 
ators  Grimes,  Trumbull,  and  Fessenden  —  cannot 
be  described.  Certainly  it  greatly  widened  the 
breach  constantly  breaking  out  between  Fessenden 
and  Sumner;  but  when  the  great  Maine  senator 
died  a  year  later,  Sumner's  eulogy  was  the  expres 
sion  of  an  admiration  which  had  survived  all  their 
differences. 

Johnson's  term  of  office  lasted  a  brief  year  longer ; 


272  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

but  the  contest  was  over.  The  winter  which  followed 
the  impeachment  had  its  own  importance,  but  its 
political  excitements  were  no  longer  the  same  excite 
ments  which  had  torn  the  capital  and  the  country  for 
three  years. 


THE  ELECTION  OF  GRANT.  273 


CHAFFER    XXIV. 
1868-1870. 

THE     ELECTION      OF      GRANT.  LOUISIANA. THE      FIF 
TEENTH  AMENDMENT. SUMNER'S     FOURTH    ELECTION 

TO    SENATE. 

A  PRESIDENTIAL  election  occupied  the  country  imme 
diately  upon  the  close  of  the  impeachment  trial. 
Indeed,  that  contest  was  not  without  its  direct  as 
well  as  indirect  connection  with  this  fact.  In  the  Re 
publican  convention,  which  met  before  the  trial  ended, 
the  nomination  of  Grant  was  something  more  than 
a  foregone  conclusion.  The  convention  was  fiercely 
on  the  side  of  Congress  in  the  struggle,  and  all  its 
factions  united  in  the  unconditional  assertion  of  those 
principles.  So  far  as  Republicans  could  bring  it 
about,  the  country  should  pronounce  for  a  real  re 
construction.  But  if  the  work  of  the  Republican 
convention  was  cut  out  beforehand,  the  Democrats 
were  by  no  means  in  the  same  case.  A  very  difficult 
and  perplexing  problem  stared  them  in  the  face  on 
the  4th  of  July,  when  they  met  in  New  York.  The 
political  situation  from  their  standpoint  was  like  a 
game.  Skilfully  played,  and  played  all  together,  the 
presidency  might  be  theirs ;  but  could  it  be  so  played  ? 
The  fiercest  of  the  unrepentant  rebels  insisted  upon 
their  place  and  position  in  the  innermost  councils  of 
18 


274  CHARLES  SUMMER. 

the  party ;  and  since  that  party  was  building  its  hopes 
of  success  on  the  assertion  of  their  constitutional 
right  to  be  there,  they  could  not  be  ignored.  But 
their  presence  was  a  constant  irritation  to  the  war  ele 
ment  of  both  parties,  and  a  constant  menace  to  the 
success  of  the  Democracy  at  the  polls.  No  less  trouble 
some  a  faction  was  composed  of  the  friends  of  George 
H.  Pendleton,  of  Ohio,  who  were  determined  on  two 
things :  the  success  of  their  candidate  at  any  cost, 
and  the  success  of  what  was  known  as  the  "  Green 
back  policy,"  —  another  dangerous  advocacy  in  the 
unsettled  state  of  business.  The  friends  of  Andrew 
Johnson  were  eager  for  his  vindication,  and  had  much 
promise  of  accomplishing  it.  Two  other  factions 
which  proved  strong  enough  to  be  reckoned  with, 
and  which  time  showed  to  have  staying  qualities,  were 
the  friends  of  General  Hancock  and  the  friends  of 
Senator  Heridricks.  But  all  these  elements  could  not 
draw  the  attention  of  the  whole  country  as  did  the 
presence  in  New  York  of  another  candidate  whose 
name  loomed  up  over  all  the  others.  Chief-Justice 
Chase  had  verified  Lincoln's  prediction  that  nothing 
could  keep  him  from  ambition  for  the  White  House. 
Strangely  enough,  feeling  the  place  of  Chief-Justice  a 
thing  to  be  given  up  for  the  sake  of  being  President, 
he  had  gradually  and  at  last  entirely  gone  over  to  the 
Democratic  party,  in  the  hope  of  a  nomination  which 
he  despaired  of  securing  at  Republican  hands.  More 
than  one  element  desired  to  see  him  at  the  head  of 
the  ticket.  The  powerful  New  York  cabal  had  long 
determined  upon  it,  and  were  playing  a  fine  game  to 
bring  it  about.  He  was  the  second  choice  of  several 


ELECTION  OF  GRANT.  275 

factions ;  and,  what  was  a  stronger  motive,  he  could 
be  used  to  defeat  enemies.  There  were  a  large 
number  of  disturbed  and  conservative  Republicans 
who  would,  it  was  believed,  vote  for  him,  and  help 
achieve  success ;  and  by  no  means  the  least  thing  on 
his  side  was  the  personal  influence  of  Mrs.  Sprague, 
who,  following  the  example  long  set  by  English  ladies, 
used  all  her  intellectual  powers  and  personal  charm 
and  political  sagacity  to  fulfil  her  threat  to  Sumner 
that  she  would  carry  her  father  to  the  White  House. 
The  inside  history  of  this  convention,  with  its  argu 
ments  and  intrigues  and  heated  discussion,  is  an 
exciting  chapter  in  political  history,  and  its  outcome 
concerned  men  of  all  political  complexions.  In  the 
end,  the  personal  enmities  and  ambitions  of  the  vari 
ous  leaders  and  their  candidates,  joined  with  the 
persistence  of  the  Southern  element,  carried  the  con 
vention.  Horatio  Seymour,  identified  with  the  hated 
"  peace  policy,"  and  Frank  Blair,  Jr.,  of  late  especially 
outspoken  in  his  denunciations  of  Congress,  were 
nominated.  The  platform,  besides  pronouncing  for 
the  Greenback  policy,  violently  denounced  the  recon 
struction  measures,  declaring  them  usurpations,  un 
constitutional,  revolutionary,  and  void.  The  issue 
which  the  Republicans  made  was  accepted.  The 
question  was  to  be  fought  at  the  polls  once  more. 
Wade  Hampton,  who  gloried  in  being  one  of  the 
bitterest  of  rebels,  shortly  declared  at  Charleston  that 
he  himself  had  written  this  resolution,  and  that  he 
was  assured  by  leading  Northern  Democrats  that  the 
South  had  only  to  "  help  them  once  to  regain  the 
power,  and  they  would  do  their  utmost  to  relieve  the 


276  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

Southern  states,  and  restore  to  us  the  Union  and 
the  Constitution  as  it  had  existed  before  the  war." 
What  Stunner  thought  of  the  issue  may  be  seen  in 
his  campaign  utterances.  In  sober  argument  or  in 
less  restrained  public  speech  he  had  but  one  message. 
He  said  to  the  people  of  Massachusetts  :  - — 

"  You  are  to  decide  on  the  means  for  the  final  suppres 
sion  of  the  Rebellion,  and  the  establishment  of  security 
for  the  future.  Shall  the  Rebellion  which  you  have  sub 
dued  on  the  bloody  field  be  permitted  to  assert  its  power 
again,  or  shall  it  be  trampled  out  so  that  its  infamous 
pretensions  shall  disappear  forever  ?  These  general 
questions  involve  the  whole  issue.  If  you  sympathize 
with  the  Rebellion,  or  decline  to  take  security  against  its 
recurrence,  then  vote  for  Seymour  and  Blair.  I  need 
not  add  that  if  you  are  in  earnest  against  the  Rebellion, 
and  seek  just  safeguards  for  the  Republic,  then  vote  for 
Grant  and  Colfax." 

And  lest  it  be  thought  that  this  was  but  the 
extravagant  utterance  of  a  political  campaign,  a  sin 
gle  other  quotation  shows  as  in  a  picture  the  truth 
of  what  he  constantly  elaborated  with  proof  of  all 
kinds  :  — 

"As  loyalty  is  the  distinctive  characteristic  of  our 
party,  so  is  disloyalty  the  distinctive  characteristic  of  the 
opposition.  I  would  not  use  too  strong  language,  or  go 
beyond  the  strictest  warrant  of  facts,  but  I  am  obliged 
to  say  that  we  cannot  recognize  the  opposition  at  this 
time  as  anything  else  but  the  Rebel  Party  in  disguise,  or 
the  Rebel  Party  under  the  alias  of  Democracy.  The 
Rebels  have  taken  the  name  of  Democrats,  and  with  this 
historic  name  hope  to  deceive  the  people  into  their 
support.  But  whatever  name  they  adopt,  they  are  the 


ELECTION  OF  GRANT.  277 

same  Rebels  who,  after  defeat  on  many  bloody  fields,  at 
last  surrendered  to  General  Grant,  and  by  the  blessing 
of  God  and  the  exertions  of  the  good  people,  will  sur 
render  to  him  again. 

"  I  am  unwilling  to  call  such  a  party  Democratic.  It 
is  not  so  in  any  sense.  Look  at  the  history  of  their 
leaders,  -  Rebels  all !  Rebels  all !  I  mention  only  those 
who  take  an  active  part.  What  a  company!  Here  is 
Forrest,  with  the  blood  of  Fort  Pillow  still  dripping  from 
his  hands;  Semmes,  fresh  from  the  '  Alabama,'  glorying 
in  his  piracies  on  our  commerce ;  Wade  Hampton,  the 
South  Carolina  slavemaster  and  cavalry  officer  of  the  Re 
bellion  ;  Beauregard,  the  Rebel  general  who  telegraphed 
for  the  execution  of  Abolition  prisoners ;  Stephens, 
Toombs,  and  Cobb,  a  Georgia  triumvirate  of  Rebels  ; 
and  at  the  head  of  this  troop  is  none  other  than  Horatio 
Seymour  of  New  York,  who,  without  actually  enlisting  in 
the  Rebellion,  dallied  with  it,  and  addressed  its  fiendish 
representatives  in  New  York  as  *  friends.'  A  party  with 
such  leaders  and  such  a  chief  is  the  Rebel  Party." 

The  country  agreed  with  Sumner  by  an  overwhelm 
ing  majority.  Nevertheless,  there  were  already  ap 
pearing  certain  indications  of  change,  —  certain  little 
clouds  which  four  years  later  seemed  for  a  time  likely 
to  overspread  the  whole  heavens,  and  which  did  in 
fact  so  hide  the  true  course  of  events  as  to  blind  the 
eyes  of  many  men.  But  for  the  time  the  country 
spoke  in  the  same  fashion  as  it  had  been  wont  to  do 
since  1861  ;  and  if  the  words  of  Grant,  "  Let  us  have 
peace,"  proved  to  be  only  hope,  and  not  prophecy, 
that  was  hidden  for  the  time,  and  the  country  be 
lieved  we  were  on  the  eve  of  their  fulfilment. 

Congress,  reinforced  by  the  result  of  the  election, 
went  on  its  vigorous  way  more  earnestly  than  ever. 


278  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

In  the  last  session  of  the  Fortieth  Congress,  it  was 
principally  concerned  with  a  long  discussion  over 
the  electoral  vote  of  Louisiana,  and  with  the  passage 
of  the  Fifteenth  Amendment  to  the  Constitution, 
guaranteeing  the  right  of  suffrage  "  without  regard  to 
race,  colour,  or  previous  condition  of  servitude." 
Louisiana,  from  the  days  of  Jefferson  till  this  present 
the  fruitful  mother  of  disturbance,  carried  on  its  elec 
tion  by  that  course  of  violent  intimidation  of  voters 
so  beloved  of  the  South,  and  believed  by  it  so  neces 
sary  to  public  safety ;  and  Congress  was  called  upon 
to  decide  whether  its  presidential  vote  should  be 
received  by  the  electoral  college.  There  was  the 
widest  difference  of  opinion  as  to  the  proper  treat 
ment  of  the  problem  ;  but  notwithstanding  the  large 
and  aggressive  Republican  majority,  it  was  deter 
mined  not  to  refuse  the  vote  of  that  state.  Sumner 
took  a  large  share  in  the  debate,  feeling  that  the 
course  of  Louisiana  was  too  conspicuous  an  illustra 
tion  of  the  temper  of  the  South  to  pass  unnoticed. 
He  had  once  defeated  the  establishment  of  the  old 
government  there ;  he  could  not  now,  he  felt,  ac 
quiesce  in  a  course  which  had  the  same  practical 
effect,  with  the  added  injury  of  legal  sanction.  The 
debate,  slight  as  it  was,  and  without  special  result 
(since  the  vote  of  Louisiana  had  no  effect  on  the 
election),  was  of  importance  as  the  beginning  of  a 
long  series  of  such  discussions,  lasting  months  after 
Sumner's  death. 

The  passage  of  the  Fifteenth  Amendment  was  the 
last  great  act  of  the  anti- slavery  battle.  It  prohib 
ited  any  state  to  deny  longer  those  equal  rights  for 


THE  FIFTEENTH  AMENDMENT.  279 

which  Sumner  had  contended  during  a  lifetime ;  but 
his  vote  was  wanting,  and  his  voice  was  lifted  up 
against  it.  He  took  the  position  so  familiar  on  the 
other  two  amendments,  —  that  the  Constitution  al 
ready  granted  the  right  to  suffrage,  and  to  imply  the 
contrary  was  a  libel  on  that  great  instrument.  On 
the  other  occasions  he  had,  under  protest,  and  after 
much  juggling  with  words  and  phrases,  accepted 
the  situation,  and  voted  for  the  amendments;  but 
this  time  he  preferred  his  consistency  to  his  record. 
Believing  that  the  only  necessary  action  on  the  part 
of  Congress  was  a  statute,  he  introduced  a  bill  to 
that  effect  at  the  earliest  moment,  but  only  eight 
men  voted  with  him  for  so  futile  a  proposition.  How 
much  effect  this  defeat  had  upon  his  course  in  voting 
against  the  amendment,  it  is  difficult  to  say.  He 
often  opposed  legislation  for  even  less  reason,  and 
resentment  at  opposition  sometimes  decided  his 
vote ;  but  it  is  incredible  that  such  causes  as  these 
could  move  a  man  of  his  calibre  to  an  action  which 
in  a  crowning  moment  contradicted  his  whole  career. 
In  1865,  his  old  friend  Dana  wrote  of  him  in  the  ' 
freedom  of  private  correspondence, — 

*'  Sumner  never  did  care  a  farthing  for  the  Constitu 
tion,  is  impatient  of  law,  and  considers  his  oath  to  have 
been  not  to  the  Constitution,  but  to  the  Declaration  of 
Independence.  If  the  negro  votes,  he  does  not  care  how 
the  result  is  obtained  or  what  else  may  follow." 

How,  then,  had  he  come  to  such  a  different  mind 
in  1869?  Who  can  tell  the  motives  that  move 
the  mind  of  man?  It  is  true  that  Sumner  believed 
the  Fifteenth  Amendment  unnecessary,  but  why  he 


280  CHARLES  SUMNER. 


should  refuse  to  vote  for  it,  no  adequate  reason 
has  yet  been  given.  None  of  the  awful  results  so 
graphically  depicted  in  his  speech  against  the  meas 
ure  followed  during  the  period  of  ratification ;  and 
when,  after  the  lapse  of  a  year,  the  ratification 
was  proclaimed,  the  sublime  seems  to  have  been 
combined  with  the  ridiculous  in  the  action  of  the 
negroes  of  the  District  of  Columbia,  who  expressed 
their  joy  in  a  serenade  to  Surnner.  It  is  hardly 
possible  to  read  without  a  smile  the  speech  in  which 
he,  who  had  done  his  utmost  to  defeat  the  measure, 
congratulated  them  upon  the  great  result  which 
changed  the  promise  of  the  Declaration  of  Inde 
pendence  into  performance.  Perhaps  it  is  hardly 
surprising  that  he  at  once  turned  from  the  past  to 
the  future,  from  "  our  triumphs "  to  "  our  duties," 
and  dwelt  upon  the  need  of  civil  rights  rather  than 
upon  the  grant  of  political  rights. 

The  elections  had  a  personal  interest  to  Sumner, 
who  was  again  a  candidate  for  the  Senate.  This  time 
it  was  a  simple  matter,  however ;  no  secret  confer 
ences  were  necessary.  Massachusetts  was  with  him 
and  for  him.  Out  of  the  forty  members  of  the  Mas 
sachusetts  Senate,  only  two  voted  against  him  ;  and  in 
the  House  he  had  two  hundred  and  sixteen  of  the 
two  hundred  and  thirty-two  votes  cast.  In  such 
fashion  did  he  return  to  the  Senate  for  the  last 
time;  and  March  4,  1869,  tne  day  °f  Grant's  in 
auguration,  Charles  Sumner  took  his  oath  as  senator 
of  the  United  States  for  his  foiHth  term. 


SUMNER  AND  PRESIDENT  GRANT.        281 


CHAPTER   XXV. 

1869-1871. 

SUMNER    AND   PRESIDENT   GRANT. JOHNSON- CLARENDON 

TREATY.  —  SAN    DOMINGO. "ALABAMA"    CLAIMS. 

IN  any  discussion  of  the  life  or  career  of  Senator 
Sumner,  among  the  first  points  touched  upon  is  sure 
to  be  his  relations  with  General  Grant.  In  the  pub 
lic  mind,  the  occurrences  of  this  period  and  their 
result  in  his  desertion  of  his  lifelong  political  asso 
ciates  have  overshadowed  much  that  is  of  greater 
importance.  In  fact,  Sumner's  career  had  already 
reached  its  climax,  and  its  further  achievements  were 
only  the  finishing  of  things  already  begun ;  but  the 
last  six  years  of  his  life  were  a  mystery  that  the  pub 
lic  is  always  trying  to  understand.  It  was  the 
experienced  Walpole  who  declared  that  it  was  well- 
nigh  impossible  to  trace  the  causes  of  disputes  among 
statesmen,  and  few  better  illustrations  could  be  found. 
It  is  a  skein  which  never  yet  has  been  unravelled, 
and  probably  never  can  be ;  for  it  is  so  intertwisted 
with  incompatible  temperaments,  misunderstandings, 
personal  grievances,  and  prejudice,  that  no  one  pur 
pose  or  single  motive  is  sufficient  to  explain  the  action 
of  any  person  in  the  controversy.  Moreover,  two  dis 
tinct  measures  were  mixed  together  in  a  manner  that 


282  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

greatly  complicates  the  matter ;  but  neither  can  be 
considered  apart  from  the  other,  by  reason  of  this 
arbitrary  entanglement.  A  third  measure,  which  long 
preceded  the  others,  still  cast  its  shadow  over  the 
scene.  If,  therefore,  the  account  of  this  imbroglio 
is  somewhat  difficult  of  comprehension,  it  cannot  be 
helped ;  for  certainly  no  clear  explanation  can  be 
given.  A  chronological  statement  of  facts,  some  of 
them  at  first  sight  apparently  unrelated,  will  show  the 
small  streams  that  at  last  rushed  together  to  make 
the  deluging  cataract. 

One  of  the  last  experiences  of  Sumner  and  Seward 
with  foreign  affairs  arose  over  the  proposed  sale  to 
our  government  of  the  islands  of  St.  Thomas  and  St. 
John  by  the  government  of  Denmark.  For  three 
years,  between  1866  and  1869,  these  negotiations 
hung  in  the  balance,  vigorously  championed  by  Sec 
retary  Seward,  violently  opposed  by  Senator  Sumner. 
The  discussion  is  still  hot  over  the  truth  in  that 
affair.  The  Senate  finally  refused  to  confirm  the 
treaty  which  President  Johnson  and  Secretary  Seward 
had  already  negotiated,  and  the  merits  of  the  pur 
chase  need  not  now  be  discussed.  But  the  whole 
matter  became  a  part  of  the  great  controversy  be 
tween  the  Executive  and  Congress.  The  President 
and  the  Department  of  State  had  negotiated  this 
treaty ;  therefore,  if  for  no  other  reason,  the  Senate 
would  not  consent  to  it.  In  this  light  the  occur 
rence  had  much  influence  over  the  future ;  and  abso 
lutely  without  direct  connection  though  it  was  with 
later  events,  its  effect  was  evident  when  a  little  later 
another  President  negotiated  another  treaty  for  the 
purchase  of  another  West  Indian  island. 


JOHNSON-CLARENDON  TREATY.  283 

In  the  very  beginning  of  President  Grant's  admin 
istration,  a  measure  came  before  the  Senate  which 
proved  an  event  in  Charles  Summer's  career.  That 
body  still  met  on  the  4th  of  March,  and  the  new 
Senate  was  immediately  confronted  with  the  Johnson- 
Clarendon  treaty,  —  a  measure  left  over  from  John 
son's  administration  and  Seward's  diplomacy.  The 
claim  against  England  for  the  depredations  com 
mitted  upon  our  commerce  by  the  "  Alabama  "  was 
presented  immediately  upon  the  close  of  the  war; 
but  for  more  than  four  years  the  British  government, 
whether  Tory  or  Liberal,  had  peremptorily  declined 
either  arbitration  or  any  settlement  whatever.  And 
now  the  treaty  so  long  looked  for  proved  insult  piled 
upon  injuries,  being  no  more  nor  less  than  an  agree 
ment  to  pay  the  individual  claims  as  a  matter  of 
private  contract,  leaving  the  question  of  national  rela 
tions  untouched.  The  wrong  done  was  "  unatoned 
for  and  unacknowledged."  Sumner,  in  making  the 
report  of  the  Committee  on  Foreign  Relations,  an 
nounced  that  for  the  first  time  in  his  experience  that 
committee  had  rejected  a  treaty,  but  this  they  would 
have  none  of.  In  a  speech  which  handled  the  ques 
tion  without  gloves,  he  set  forth  not  only  the  glaring 
defects  of  the  treaty,  but  expounded  so  that  the 
wayfaring  man  could  but  understand,  the  feeling  of 
the  United  States  on  the  English  treatment  of  our 
country.  President  Grant  duly  notified  the  Queen, 
through  Minister  Motley,  that  the  matter  would  be 
suspended  for  a  time  ;  and  after  a  year  of  quiet  wait 
ing  and  able  management  on  the  part  of  the  Presi 
dent  and  his  Secretary  of  State,  Hamilton  Fish,  it 


284  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

came  to  a  successful  issue.  In  the  course  of  its 
progress,  however,  this  matter  bore  much  relation 
to  Sumner's  public  life.  His  speech  on  the  treaty 
was  indeed  remarkably  powerful  and  remarkably  plain, 
and  it  rendered  the  ratification  of  that  treaty  impos 
sible.  He  exposed  the  hypocrisy  of  England  in  her 
ill -concealed  assistance  to  the  Confederate  cause,  and 
charged  it  to  her  commercial  greed  as  well  as  her 
political  antipathies.  He  accused  the  anti-slavery  ad 
vocate  among  the  nations  of  being  at  heart  a  lover 
of  slavery  ;  he  plainly  set  forth  its  flimsy  pretexts  and 
breaches  of  diplomatic  courtesy.  Not  a  point  was 
left  untouched.  He  then  further  developed  with 
eloquence  and  power  the  outrage  to  our  national 
feeling,  and  claimed  indemnity  for  the  "  indirect 
damages  "  to  a  nation  in  the  heat  of  war  when  its 
adversary  is  succoured  and  supported.  Believing  that 
loss  of  honour  would  not  strike  the  popular  mind 
in  England  as  would  pounds  and  shillings,  he  boldly 
added  up  the  loss  to  our  commerce,  the  loss  to  future 
commerce,  the  cost  of  the  navy  required  to  meet  the 
results  of  English  interference,  the  prolongation  of 
the  war  caused  by  English  sympathy  (he  counted  it 
doubled  in  length),  and  charged  Great  Britain  as 
justly  in  debt  to  us  for  hundreds  of  millions  of  pounds 
sterling.  The  result  proved  that  he  had  known  his 
audience.  The  claim  of  "  indirect  damages  "  was 
the  point  that  touched  most  deeply.  All  the  charges 
of  national  dishonour  did  not  hurt  a  tenth  part  as 
much  as  the  claim  for  the  payment  of  treasure.  Such 
was  the  indignation  in  high  places  that  the  speech 
itself  was  not  printed  in  any  English  paper,  but  was 


"ALABAMA"    CLAIMS.  285 

sent  over  from  this  country  in  pamphlet  form.  Eng 
land  and  his  English  friends  never  forgave  Sumner. 
His  course  in  the  "Trent"  affair  seemed  inexpli 
cable;  this  was  indefensible.  To  appreciate  thor 
oughly  his  action,  one  must  remember  his  feeling  for 
England,  and  how  much  he  valued  his  English  con 
nections  and  friends.  What  he  sacrificed  has  never 
been  better  described  than  by  George  W.  Smalley, 
writing  at  the  time  of  Sumner's  death.  He  says  :  — 

"  It  would  be  idle  to  try  to  disguise  the  fact  that 
Mr.  Sumner,  of  late  years,  was  more  disliked  in  England 
than  any  other  American.  To  some  extent  he  was  aware 
of  this,  and  it  gave  him  pain.  .  .  .  He  was  deeply  grieved 
to  be  misunderstood  and  harshly  censured  by  old  friends. 
Some  things  said  of  him  in  private  during  his  lifetime 
came  to  his  ears,  and  he  winced  under  them.  .  .  .  His 
sensitiveness  never  left  him,  and  to  the  last  he  felt  keenly 
whatever  was  said  against  him.  His  courage  did  not 
consist  in  hardening  himself  against  cruel  taunts,  but  in 
enduring  steadfastly  the  agony  —  for  it  was  often  that  — 
which  a  rankling  shaft  cost  him.  I  never  knew  an 
American  so  profoundly  attached  to  England.  His  repu 
tation  here  was  only  less  dear  to  him  than  his  reputation 
at  home.  That  he  should  have  hesitated  to  speak  the 
truth  when  it  required  to  be  spoken  about  England  never 
occurred  to  him.  He  spoke  of  it  as  freely  as  he  spoke 
of  the  wicked  institutions  and  criminal  doings  of  his  own 
country  in  the  days  of  slavery." 

In  these  last  sentences  Mr.  Smalley  touches  on  an 
important  aspect  of  Sumner's  action.  It  was  accord 
ing  to  his  temperament  that  he  himself  never  could 
understand  the  English  rage  at  this  speech.  Having 
set  forth  the  facts  as  he  saw  them,  he  absolutely 


286  CHARLES  SUMMER. 

could  not  comprehend  why  England  was  not  con 
vinced  to  the  point  of  accepting  his  position.  In 
the  midst  of  the  controversy  he  said,  writing  to  Presi 
dent  Magoun :  — 

"  I  have  never  known  England  behave  so  badly.  My 
voice  is  the  most  friendly  she  will  hear.  My  object  was 
in  all  sincerity  and  simplicity  to  state  our  grievance,  what 
I  called  our  case  against  England,  being  all  that  causes 
our  sense  of  wrong,  leaving  it  to  the  government  here 
after  to  determine  how  much  of  this  we  could  pardon  or 
forego.  In  my  judgment,  the  first  stage  of  this  discus 
sion  must  be  what  we  suffered,  stated  plainly.  England 
must  see  and  know  it.  Until  she  does,  she  will  make  no 
adequate  return." 

The  "  Daily  News,"  discussing  his  position,  at  a 
date  when  passion  was  forgotten,  said :  — 

"  A  speech  which  sounded  like  a  declaration  of  war, 
Mr.  Sumner  always  insisted,  with  an  almost  naive  vehe 
mence,  was  prepared  and  delivered  in  the  single  interest 
of  friendship  and  peace.  Strange  and  unintelligible  as 
this  seems  to  us,  it  is  certain  that  it  was  Mr.  Sumner's 
honest  conviction,  and  that  he  was  quite  astonished  when 
so  many  of  his  firmest  English  friends  remonstrated  with 
him  on  the  extraordinary  nature  of  the  position  he  had 
taken  up." 

Another  prominent  English  journal  said,  with  much 
justice  :  — 

"  He  held  that  a  great  injury  had  been  done  to  the 
Union,  —  an  injury  which  had  entered  deeply  into  the 
American  mind,  which  for  the  well-being  of  both  coun 
tries  it  would  be  wise  fully  and  fairly  to  adjust,  .  .  . 
maintaining  it  to  be  as  much  for  the  good  of  the  King- 


SUMNER  AND  PRESIDENT  GRANT.        287 

dom  as  of  the  Republic,  that  such  should  be  the  adjust 
ment  ;  the  first  point  in  this  consideration  would  be  to 
state  what  the  grievance  was." 

Feeling  thus,  he  never  imagined  the  storm  his 
words  would  arouse,  as  when  he  espoused  the  anti- 
slavery  cause,  he  did  not  dream  of  the  extent  of  his 
sacrifice.  He  was  a  man  of  the  single  eye,  and  did 
not  comprehend  that  source  of  weakness  and  hesita 
tion,  a  double  vision,  the  contemplation  of  conse 
quences  also.  It  is  not  so  much  moral  courage  as 
moral  earnestness  that  we  must  admire  in  Charles 
Sumner ;  and  nowhere  shall  we  find  a  better  exam 
ple  of  force  and  power  given  by  such  an  enthusiasm 
for  principle  as  hides  entirely  any  hesitation  or  any 
consideration  of  consequences. 

One  of  General  Grant's  greatest  traits  was  the 
ability  to  learn.  He  would  quietly  take  in  the  situa 
tion,  see  where  it  agreed  or  differed  from  his  own 
estimate,  and  learn  what  his  duty  should  be ;  then 
without  words  he  would  turn  his  steps  about.  But 
this  implies  that  at  first  he  did  not  know  all  that  he 
came  to  know  in  four  years,  much  less  in  eight.  In 
1869,  he  by  no  means  took  the  broad  views  he  had 
learned  before  1877.  And  great  as  he  became  as  a 
civil  officer,  he  entered  upon  that  career  with  all  the 
limitations  of  an  exclusively  military  habit  of  mind ; 
and  with  the  rest  went  a  resolute  opposition  to  all 
who  directly  differed  with  him.  Whatever  he  might 
learn  by  indirection,  he  would  receive  no  direct  sug 
gestions  —  much  less  control  —  from  a  subordinate, 
as  he  considered  all  those  around  him.  Moreover, 
he  had  a  justified  confidence  in  his  own  judgment 


288  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

of  men ;  but  he  forgot  that  he  had  no  experience 
on  which  to  base  such  judgment  of  civil  officers, 
while  his  loyalty  to  his  friends  was  as  dangerous  in 
the  President  as  it  was  noble  in  the  man.  There 
could  scarcely  have  been  discovered  a  temperament 
so  poorly  fitted  to  understand  Sumner  or  co-operate 
with  him  as  that  of  Grant. 

It  has  already  been  suggested  that  Grant's  some 
what  conservative  course  toward  the  South,  as  well 
as  his  first  attitude  toward  Stanton,  and  other  similar 
actions,  had  prejudiced  Sumner  against  him.  On  the 
other  hand,  Surnner's  "  whitewashing  "  epithet  and 
general  attitude  had  created  an  unpleasant  impression 
in  the  mind  of  Grant.  Other  reasons  for  prejudice 
lay  below  any  acknowledged  distrust.  It  was  at  this 
period  that  in  private  conversation  Sumner  exhibited 
his  surprise  that  he  had  not  been  the  choice  of  his 
party  for  President;  and  during  the  time  between 
Grant's  election  and  the  announcement  of  his  Cab 
inet,  Sumner  discussed  with  more  than  one  friend  the 
question  whether  he  should  accept  the  position  of  Sec 
retary  of  State,  which  he  felt  sure  would  be  tendered 
to  him.  When,  therefore,  that  position  was  given  to  a 
member  of  the  House  of  Representatives  from  Illinois, 
without  special  qualifications  for  the  conduct  of  our 
foreign  affairs,  Sumner  was  in  no  mood  to  look  favour 
ably  upon  Grant's  judgment.  The  two  men  clashed 
immediately  over  another  Cabinet  appointment, — that 
of  Alexander  T.  Stewart  as  Secretary  of  the  Treasury. 
A  confidential  friend  and  devoted  admirer  of  Sumner 
attributes  the  beginning  of  the  differences  on  Sumner's 
part  to  pique  at  the  failure  of  the  President  to  consult 


SUMNER  AND  PRESIDENT  GRANT.        289 

him  in  the  formation  of  the  Cabinet,  and  on  Grant's 
part  to  the  heat  with  which  the  President  regarded 
the  Senator's  opposition  to  the  appointment  of  Stew 
art.  But  whatevei  may  have  started  the  difficulty, 
it  grew  rapidly.  Just  at  this  time  John  Lothrop  Mot 
ley  was  sent  as  minister  to  England.  Motley  was 
the  intimate  personal  friend  of  Sumner,  and  the 
appointment,  fit  as  it  was  in  the  light  of  a  tribute, 
and  unfit  as  it  proved  to  be  in  a  diplomatic  light, 
was  altogether  due  to  the  Senator's  wish.  When  the 
new  minister  came  to  Washington  for  an  interview 
with  the  President,  General  Grant  was  so  unfavourably 
impressed  that  he  said  to  an  official  in  high  office, 
"  If  I  had  not  promised  Sumner,  I  would  not  appoint 
Motley."  Unfortunately  the  charge  made  against 
him  in  the  infamous  McCracken  letter,  which  had 
caused  his  recall  from  Vienna,  was  of  undue  sym 
pathy  with  Congress  and  of  hostility  to  the  President ; 
so  that  later  on,  when  Grant  found  himself  also  in  a 
controversy  with  the  Senate,  the  old  charge  returned 
to  mind  ;  and  seeming  as  it  did  to  coincide  with  the 
present  situation,  it  served  a  new  turn  in  increasing 
the  prejudice  already  too  strong  in  the  mind  of  the 
President,  —  a  prejudice  created,  as  we  have  seen, 
by  his  own  personal  impression.  The  first  diplo 
matic  transactions  of  the  new  minister  were  unfortu 
nately  calculated  to  confirm  this  prejudice.  During 
the  early  summer  of  1869,  a  difference  of  interpreta 
tion  occurred  between  Mr.  Motley  and  Secretary  Fish 
over  the  conduct  of  the  "  Alabama  "  negotiations.  A 
great  conflict  of  statement  and  even  decided  ques 
tions  of  veracity  have  arisen  between  the  principal 
19 


290  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

actors  as  to  what  was  said  and  done,  or  when  and 
how  certain  transactions  occurred  and  certain  con 
clusions  were  reached ;    but  in  the  main  the  fact  is 
established    that    in    his   informal    conversations  and 
official  communications  Minister  Motley  reflected  the 
views  and  opinions  of  Senator  Sumner  as  just  ex 
pressed  in  his  aggressive  speech,  rather  than  the  more 
conservative  wishes  of  President  Grant.     This  seems 
to  have  happened  partly  by  reason  of  the  fact  that 
during  the   preliminary  visit  in  Washington  already 
mentioned,  Motley  and  Fish  had  agreed   upon   the 
course  to  be  pursued  over  the  dinner-table  at  Sum- 
ner's  house,  and  had  even  agreed  upon  the  nature 
of  the  "  formal  instructions  ;  "  but  afterward  General 
Grant  altered  these  instructions,  and    insisted  on  a 
much  more  moderate  point  of  view.      It  is  said  that 
he  added  fuel  to  a  fire  ready  to  be  kindled  when  he 
deliberately  drew  his  pen  through  many  of  Mr.  Sum- 
ner's  sonorous  but  vague  phrases  embodied  in  these 
instructions.      Motley,  however,  knowing  nothing  of 
these  things,  not  unnaturally  continued   to  interpret 
the  letter  of  the  written  words  by  the  spirit  of  the  re 
membered  conversation.     Moreover,  both  old  friend 
ship  and  the  prejudice  of  an  experienced  diplomat 
led  him  to  feel  that   Sumner's  view  must  be  better 
than   that  of  an  unlearned  military  officer,  with  no 
knowledge  of  foreign  lands  or  courts.   ,  He  was,  too, 
as  rabid  an  American  as  Sumner  in  his  personal  feel 
ings;  and  whatever  may  be  his  just  fame  in  other 
directions,  it  must  be  concluded  that  tact  was  not  his 
prominent  quality.      All  this  he  immediately  made 
evident  to  the  President  and  State  Department  by 


SAN  DOMINGO.  291 

the  tone  of  his  interviews  with  the  foreign  office ;  but 
the  whole  matter  was  in  abeyance,  and  the  Secretary 
of  State  evidently  thought  such  difficulties  of  little 
practical  consequence,  since  it  would  be  easy  to 
arrange  the  negotiations  himself,  and  counteract  or 
overrule  Motley  if  occasion  should  require. 

During  the  summer  the  President  was  much  occu 
pied  with  a  question  of  diplomacy  nearer  home, 
which  shortly  came  to  bear  its  own  relation  in  the 
Senate  to  the  English  troubles.  This  ambitious  pro 
ject  was  a  scheme  for  annexing  the  West  Indian 
republic  of  Dominica,  occupying  the  western  half  of 
the  island  of  San  Domingo.  The  black  republic  of 
Hayti  occupied  the  eastern  half  of  this  island,  and  a 
successful  revolution  had  just  released  the  Dominicans 
from  a  threatened  absorption  in  this  Haytian  republic, 
—  a  consummation  devoutly  wished  by  many  lovers  of 
Hayti  in  the  United  States.  But  the  leader  of  the 
revolution,  President  Baez,  fearing  his  success  was 
but  temporary,  sought  the  protection  of  the  United 
States  and  offered  to  sell  his  country  to  our  govern 
ment, —  a  measure  indirectly  calculated  in  the  end 
to  destroy  the  independence  of  Hayti  also.  General 
Grant,  with  the  Civil  War  fresh  in  his  mind,  and  forced 
to  remember  our  difficulties  with  England,  saw  the 
great  advantage  of  possessing  a  foothold  on  one  of 
these  islands,  especially  the  actual  necessity  of  a  coal 
ing  station  there.  Under  such  circumstances  he  lis 
tened  to  the  suggestions  of  the  Dominican  president, 
and  in  military  fashion  sent  his  secretary,  General 
Babcock,  on  a  secret  mission  of  discovery  clothed 
with  somewhat  military  powers.  When  the  Senate 


292  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

met  in  December,  1869,  they  found  that  this  young 
gentleman  had  already  negotiated  a  treaty  with  Do 
minica  ;  and  this  treaty  Grant  laid  before  the  Senate  in 
his  annual  message,  setting  forth  the  military  and,  as 
he  had  now  learned,  the  commercial  advantages  also 
of  such  a  possession.  It  was  a  measure  never  popu 
lar  with  Congress  for  a  variety  of  reasons,  not  the 
least  of  which  was  the  somewhat  unfortunate  method 
of  its  inception.  The  Senate  was  still  sensitive  as  to 
any  suspicion  of  interference  with  its  own  preroga 
tive,  and  Congress  as  a  whole  was  still  unduly  im 
pressed  with  the  belief  that  the  lion's  share  of 
government  was  lodged  in  its  hands.  It  was  not  in 
a  mood  to  be  pleased  with  this  action  of  the  Presi 
dent,  and  other  things  entered  in  to  increase  the 
unpopularity  of  the  scheme.  Surnner  was  violently 
opposed  to  it  from  the  beginning.  Grant  recognized 
the  weight  of  Sumner's  influence  in  foreign  affairs, 
and  honestly  desirous  of  conciliating  him,  went  out 
of  his  way  to  seek  the  Senator.  The  night  before  the 
meeting  of  Congress,  one  Sunday  evening,  the  Presi 
dent  walked  across  Lafayette  Park  to  Sumner's  house 
for  an  informal  conference  on  San  Domingo.  From 
beginning  to  end  this  conference  was  unfortunate. 
Some  agreements  were  entered  into,  but  they  were 
differently  understood  ;  some  discussion  occurred,  but 
it  proceeded  —  all  unknown  to  either  —  from  differ 
ent  standpoints ;  and  to  crown  the  confusion,  Sumner, 
with  his  usual  conspicuous  want  of  tact,  insisted  upon 
introducing  the  subject  of  Governor  Ashley's  removal, 
and  even  upon  reading  a  long  letter  from  that  bellig 
erent  gentleman.  Now,  that  distinguished  champion 


SAN  DOMINGO,  293 

of  the  coloured  race  had  hardly  reached  his  new  chair 
as  Governor  of  the  territory  of  Montana  before  he 
used  it  as  the  throne  of  vantage  to  criticise  the  Presi 
dent  who  placed  him  there  ;  and  Grant,  accustomed  to 
military  discipline,  did  not  hesitate  to  remove  him  as 
insubordinate.  To  Ashley  and  Sumner  and  their 
friends,  accustomed  to  abuse  successive  administra 
tions  with  their  every  breath,  —  as  their  daily  duty, 
perhaps,  —  this  was  unpardonable,  insulting,  tyranni 
cal.  Mr.  Ashley  said  as  much ;  and  it  was  the  docu 
ment  in  which  he  expressed  these  views  that  Sumner 
chose  this  occasion  to  read.  The  President  was 
equally  offended  at  the  letter  and  its  presentation. 
It  was,  he  felt,  altogether  unwarrantable  interference 
with  his  power  over  a  subordinate,  and  he  rose  to 
leave  in  some  anger.  Sumner  followed  him  to  the 
door,  declaring  that  he  "  expected  to  support  the 
measures  of  the  administration."  Again  there  was  a 
misunderstanding,  and  an  important  one.  This  vol 
untary  declaration  the  President  understood  to  refer 
to  the  business  on  which  he  had  come,  —  the  San 
Domingo  treaty  which  he  always  believed  Sumner 
then  and  there  promised  to  vote  for  and  support. 
But  the  Senator  intended  only  those  general  and 
vague  assurances  so  well  understood  by  men  experi 
enced  in  statescraft  to  mean  much  or  little  as  time  or 
occurrences  shall  determine. 

Out  of  these  and  other  different  interpretations  of 
a  single  interview  arose  much  of  the  difficulty.  It 
seemed  as  if  some  malign  atmosphere  enveloped 
the  occasion,  making  all  its  details  work  together 
for  destruction.  Even  its  trivialities  became  crimes. 


294  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

In  recounting  it  afterward,  Sumner  dwelt  much  upon 
Grant's  inexcusable,  and,  as  he  felt,  insulting  igno 
rance  of  his  own  position  and  dignities.  "  He  spoke 
of  me  a  half-dozen  times,"  said  the  irate  Sena 
tor,  "  as  the  chairman  of  the  Judiciary  Committee. 
Think  of  that !  "  After  such  fashion  did  these  two 
misunderstand  and  jar  upon  each  other,  and  each 
lose  patience  beyond  recovery.  Thus  in  addition  to 
the  differences  as  to  the  meaning  and  transactions  of 
this  famous  interview,  it  furnished  a  large  element  in 
the  growth  a?  the  prejudice  on  both  sides  which 
counted^ftJrso  much  in  the  unfortunate  result, 
^.^naer  these  circumstances,  and  understanding  the 
position  of  matters  as  he  did,  it  is  easy  to  picture 
the  President's  surprise  and  anger  when  Sumner 
immediately  and  violently  opposed  the  measure,  — 
Sumner,  who  he  had  believed  personally  promised  him 
to  support  it.  It  was  already  a  pet  measure  with 
Grant.  His  own  views  of  its  importance  were  sup 
ported  by  two  men  in  whom  he  had  supreme  confi 
dence,  —  by  that  great  military  genius,  General  Raw- 
lins,  his  Secretary  of  War,  whose  instincts  agreed 
with  Grant's  as  to  the  military  value  of  the  station, 
and  who  was,  moreover,  somewhat  of  the  filibustering 
temper,  and  by  General  Babcock,  the  President's 
trusted  secretary.  It  was  charged  afterward  that 
Babcock,  convinced  of  the  commercial  value  of  the 
island,  had  already  entered  into  large  speculations 
connected  with  it,  and  these  charges  were  much  used 
to  inflame  the  public  mind.  No  proof  was  ever  given 
of  their  truth,  and  all  the  world  knows  long  since  that 
such  an  idea  never  had  crossed  the  mind  of  President 


SAN  DOMINGO.  295 

Grant ;  but  the  charges  did  serve  to  make  him  more 
determined  still  to  vindicate  his  own  wisdom  and 
uphold  his  friend.  And  they  served  also  to  intensify 
the  opposition  of  Sumner,  who  believed  them  in  all 
their  length  and  breadth.  Time  has  proved  that 
Grant  was  right  in  his  position.  No  American  can 
look  with  satisfaction  on  our  situation  while  all  the 
islands  off  our  coast  are  in  possession  of  foreign  pow 
ers, —  a  fact  emphasized  by  the  value  these  foreign 
powers  set  upon  their  possessions  in  our  waters ;  and 
it  is  equally  true  that  the  commercial  value  of  San 
Domingo  is  by  no  means  to  be  slighted.  But  as  has 
been  said,  from  the  beginning  Sumner  was  bitterly 
opposed  to  the  measure.  He  had  determined  that 
Grant  must  be  watched  and  opposed.  His  remem 
brance  of  the  old  days  when  the  slavemasters  "  talked 
like  pirates  "  in  the  Senate  came  back  to  him ;  and 
believing  as  he  did  that  these  very  men  were  gradu 
ally  repossessing  themselves  of  the  government,  he 
thought  he  heard  their  old  plans  for  taking  forcible 
possession  of  the  West  Indian  islands  repeated  once 
more.  He  remembered  St.  Thomas,  and  this  presi 
dential  blunder  seemed  a  repetition  of  that  and  one 
more  indication  that  now  was  as  then.  Moreover,  he 
was  violently  opposed  to  the  government  of  Baez  and 
all  its  works,  especially  any  action  that  would  even 
indirectly  affect  his  beloved  republic  of  Hayti.  Thus 
his  personal  prejudice,  his  public  feeling,  and  his 
ever-sensitive  negro  nerve  were  all  aroused,  and  he 
was  thoroughly  convinced  that  this  was  an  iniquitous 
measure  in  its  inception  and  its  progress  and  its  pur 
pose.  From  the  first,  therefore,  he  fought  it  vio- 


296  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

lently.  Every  effort  was  made  to  bring  him  to  a 
different  mind.  His  old  friend,  Secretary  Fish,  used 
all  his  influence,  persuading,  arguing,  endeavouring  to 
show  Sumner  the  effect  and  result  of  the  position 
taken,  but  all  in  vain.  Sumner  himself  believed  and 
publicly  stated  that  Fish  tried  to  bribe  him  with  the 
offer  of  the  English  mission,  —  a  proposition  so  impos 
sible  that  it  serves  only  as  an  illustration  of  his  own 
absolute  blindness  to  all  humour  or  sarcasm  when 
turned  against  himself. 

On  the  3oth  of  June,  1870,  the  Senate  rejected  the 
treaty.  The  President  attributed  this  action  to  Sum- 
ner's  influence,  and  unwilling  to  believe  in  the  unpop 
ularity  of  the  measure,  gave  that  senator  much  too 
large  a  share  in  the  result.  On  the  next  day  the 
State  Department  requested  Minister  Motley  to  re 
sign.  There  is  no  doubt  that  the  immediate  reason 
for  this  was  Grant's  anger  at  Sumner.  But  there  is 
no  doubt  also  that  Grant  was  right  in  believing  Mot 
ley  entirely  in  sympathy  with  Sumner,  and  much 
under  his  influence.  And  if  the  President  and  the 
Senator  were  no  longer  in  accord,  it  followed  that  the 
President  and  his  minister  to  England  were  no  longer 
in  accord.  The  situation  at  once  became  impossible. 
Nor  is  there  any  doubt  that  for  some  time  Motley's 
attitude  and  behaviour  had  been  entirely  unsatis 
factory  to  the  administration.  His  recall  at  some 
time  was  necessary  to  the  carrying  out  of  Grant's 
ideas  in  the  "  Alabama  "  matter,  —  since  it  was  Grant 
and  not  Sumner  who  was  President  of  the  United 
States,  —  but  his  removal  at  that  time  was  a  mistake 
so  unfortunate  as  to  be  well-nigh  criminal.  The 


SAN  DOMINGO.  297 

impossibility  of  relations  between  the  administration 
and  a  minister  of  Motley's  temper  is  shown  by  the 
fact  that  although  requested  to  resign  in  June,  he 
obstinately  remained  at  his  post,  discussing  the  matter 
with  the  State  Department  and  criticising  the  Presi 
dent,  until  he  was  formally  recalled  in  November.  It 
was  now  Surnner's  turn  to  be  angry,  and  his  anger 
knew  no  bounds,  —  indeed,  with  some  reason,  for  so 
pointed  and  personal  a  revenge  for  public  action  was 
without  precedent. 

In  December,  1870,  both  our  foreign  complica 
tions,  by  a  most  unfortunate  chance,  came  to  a  head 
at  once.  President  Grant,  in  his  annual  message  to 
Congress,  again  brought  up  the  subject  of  San  Do 
mingo,  and  this  time  proposed  its  annexation  after  the 
manner  of  Texas.  He  also  requested  the  appoint 
ment  af  a  commission  to  investigate  its  value.  In 
the  same  message  he  took  up,  as  was  necessary,  the 
subject  of  our  relations  with  England,  and  recom 
mended  that  Congress  should  buy  up  all  private 
claims  against  the  "  Alabama,"  that  the  whole  question 
might  concern  the  nation  alone.  This  flank  move 
ment  had  the  expected  effect  in  the  English  foreign 
office.  In  the  disturbed  condition  of  European  af 
fairs  brought  about  by  the  Franco-German  War,  and 
in  the  face  of  a  dreaded  Fenian  outbreak  in  Canada, 
England  began  to  make  overtures  looking  to  a  re 
newal  of  these  negotiations. 

When  the  discussion  over  the  appointment  of 
commissioners  to  San  Domingo  came  up,  Sumner 
spoke  against  the  treaty  with  a  bitterness  compounded 
of  public  duty  and  private  wrong.  His  denunciations 


298  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

of  President  Grant  were  so  personal  and  so  violent  as 
to  be  without  excuse.  They  went  far  beyond  any 
license  of  debate.  And  while  they  were  carefully 
framed  not  directly  to  accuse  the  President  of  fraud, 
they  were  as  carefully  worded  to  convey  that  impres 
sion.  And  in  another  direction  Sumner  went  so  far 
as  to  deliberately  and  in  most  offensive  terms  charge 
the  President  with  an  effort  to  remove  three  of  the 
obnoxious  senators  from  the  Committee  on  Foreign 
Relations,  of  course  including  himself.  This  speech, 
naturally  enough,  rendered  impossible  any  further 
personal  communication  between  Grant  and  Sumner. 
The  San  Domingo  commissioners  were  duly  appointed 
and  sent  out.  During  their  absence,  much  more  de 
bate  was  held,  in  all  of  which  Sumner  was  promi 
nent,  reiterating  his  arguments  and  accusations,  if  not 
as  violently,  yet  with  the  same  plainness. 

Meanwhile  the  negotiations  with  England  were  pro 
gressing  with  an  astonishing  rapidity,  and  although 
the  President  had  no  relations  with  the  Senator,  the 
Secretary  of  State  was  for  some  time  in  frequent  con 
sultation  with  him  ;  but  when  in  January  the  President 
sent  to  the  Senate  the  Motley  correspondence,  its 
disclosures  broke  off  even  those  strained  relations. 
Thenceforth  the  State  Department  and  the  chairman 
of  the  Committee  on  Foreign  Relations  held  no  inter 
course  whatever,  —  did  not  even  speak  to  each  other. 
Meanwhile  a  commission  was  agreed  upon  between 
the  United  States  and  Great  Britain  to  settle  the  "  Ala 
bama  "  claims.  A  little  later  the  President  transmitted 
the  report  of  the  San  Domingo  commissioners,  up 
holding  his  judgment,  and  in  the  same  message  pre- 


"ALABAMA"    CLAIMS.  299 

sented  his  view  of  his  controversy  with  Sumner  in 
words  more  dignified,  it  must  be  confessed,  than  Sum 
ner  himself  had  chosen. 

In  February,  the  High  Joint  Commission  between 
Great  Britain  and  the  United  States  began  its  ses 
sions  in  Washington.  With  the  coming  of  the  new 
Congress  in  March,  a  reassignment  of  the  committees 
of  the  Senate  became  necessary ;  and  under  the  in 
fluence  of  the  President  and  the  Department  of 
State,  Mr.  Sumner  was  deposed  from  his  position  as 
Chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Foreign  Relations,  —  a 
position  which  he  better  than  any  other  man  in 
America  knew  how  to  fill,  and  which  he  had  adorned 
since  the  day  the  rebels  left  the  Senate  in  1861.  It 
was  an  action  so  severe  it  cannot  be  excused,  so 
necessary  it  could  not  be  avoided.  The  friends  of 
Sumner  are  right  in  calling  it  a  petty  revenge,  an  in 
excusable  insult.  The  friends  of  General  Grant  are 
right  in  declaring  that  it  was  an  absolute  necessity, 
since  it  was  clearly  impossible  that  the  official  rela 
tions  should  go  on  with  justice  to  the  nation  where 
the  personal  relations  were  such  that  no  speech  was 
possible ;  and  they  are  not  without  grounds  for  say 
ing  that  Sumner  had  abused  his  place  and  arrogated 
to  himself  power  and  influence  which  he  had  no  right 
to  exercise.  The  Senator  prepared  a  statement  jus 
tifying  himself  and  arraigning  Grant,  so  severe  in  its 
denunciations  and  so  extreme  in  its  personal  bitter 
ness  that  his  friends  —  with  some  difficulty  indeed  — 
persuaded  him  to  withhold  it  from  the  public.  It 
was,  however,  printed  and  privately  distributed,  and 
in  the  end  included  by  his  biographers  in  his  pub- 


300  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

lished  Works.  Thus  the  controversy  closed,  but  this 
was  by  no  means  its  end.  Results  followed  that  were 
not  foreseen,  and  for  Sumner  the  consequences  to  his 
career  and  the  effect  upon  him  personally  and  politi 
cally  were  wide  and  deep. 

This  bare  and  tedious  chronological  statement,  mul 
tiplied  by  the  nature  of  the  two  men  engaged,  is, 
perhaps,  the  best  explanation  that  can  be  given  of  an 
affair  as  complicated  and  mysterious  as  it  was  disas 
trous.  Edwin  Whipple,  most  subtle  of  critics  and 
lifelong  friend  of  Sumner,  in  an  appreciative  study  of 
the  great  statesman,  attributes  the  difficulty  almost 
entirely  to  the  difference  of  temperament  and  lack 
of  understanding  between  Grant,  Fish,  and  Sumner. 
He  says  among  other  things,  — 

"  Sumner  had  become  so  accustomed  to  dominate  in 
matters  of  state,  was  so  blunt  and  belligerent  in  his  con 
versation  with  Lincoln  and  Seward,  that  he  could  hardly 
understand  why  his  outspoken  advice  should  not  be  re 
ceived  by  the  new  administration  as  it  had  been  by  the 
old,"  — 

and  he  goes  on  to  suggest  that  the  inflexibility  of  Sec 
retary  Fish  and  the  resistance  of  President  Grant  fur 
nished  the  other  side  of  the  trouble.  After  the  lapse 
of  years  and  in  the  light  of  all  the  assertions  and 
counter-assertions  since  offered  to  a  public  which  still 
maintains  its  interest  in  the  matter,  no  one  can  doubt 
the  substantial  truth  of  this  explanation. 


SUMNER  AT  HOME,  301 


CHAPTER   XXVI. 

SUMNER   AT   HOME. 

IN  December,  1869,  Mr.  Sumner  moved  into  the 
house  on  the  corner  of  Lafayette  Square  in  which  he 
died,  and  which  was  in  many  ways  associated  with 
him.  To  a  large  extent  it  fulfilled  his  idea  of  a 
bachelor  home,  which  it  practically  was,  for  his  mar 
ried  life  was  already  a  thing  of  the  past  when  it 
was  first  occupied.  The  drawing-room,  libraries,  and 
dining-room,  and  especially  the  Senator's  study,  re 
flected  his  ideas  and  held  his  treasures.  In  these 
days  of  overcrowded  bric-a-brac  it  would  hardly  be 
the  aesthetic  wonder  it  seemed  at  that  time ;  but  no 
one  with  any  true  appreciation  of  the  life  of  the  world 
could  long  consider  those  treasures  without  marvel 
ling  at  the  store  collected  there.  For  the  most  part, 
it  was  the  personal,  or  what  might  be  termed  the 
literary  interest,  rather  than  the  artistic,  which  had  at 
tracted  their  observer,  and  their  arrangement  always 
bore  some  relation  to  a  dominant  idea.  Every  avail 
able  inch  upon  the  walls  and  even  upon  the  doors  was 
covered  with  paintings  and  engravings.  The  tables 
and  shelves  were  crowded  with  bronzes  and  rare  porce 
lains,  till  they  seemed  like  a  jeweller's  display ;  other 
tables  and  bookshelves,  cabinets,  chairs,  even  the  floor, 


302  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

held  rare  books,  missals,  mediaeval  manuscripts,  and 
priceless  autographs,  —  every  sort  of  treasure  dear  to 
the  heart  of  a  connoisseur.  It  is  now  said  that  among 
diem  all  the  paintings  were  of  the  least  value ;  but 
Sumner,  who  prided  himself  upon  his  knowledge  of 
art,  believed  them  to  be  undoubted  specimens  of  the 
masters.  Among  them  was  a  portrait  by  Sir  Peter 
Lely,  and  another  of  Charles  James  Fox,  by  Gains 
borough  ;  a  study  of  Hannah  More  by  Joshua  Rey 
nolds  ;  and  the  head  of  a  monk  by  Holbein.  One 
easel  held  a  "  lace-mender  "  by  Gerard  Douw,  and 
another  a  landscape  by  Hobbema.  There  were  larger 
landscapes  of  Gainsborough  and  Ruysdael  and 
Salvator  Rosa,  a  Magdalene  by  Caracci,  a  Madonna 
which  was  claimed  to  be  a  Murillo,  and  a  dozen  more 
of  interest.  But  whatever  may  be  thought  as  to  the 
real  value  of  these  paintings,  there  is  no  question  as 
to  the  value  of  the  engravings.  Crowded  into  port 
folios,  massed  upon  the  walls,  everywhere  were  these 
beautiful  works  of  art.  The  collection  contained 
specimens  of  all  the  great  engravers,  and  nothing 
short  of  a  catalogue  would  give  any  idea  of  its  range 
or  scope.  The  arrangement  of  these  pictures,  how 
ever,  was  most  interesting.  In  the  study  of  the  Chair 
man  of  the  Committee  on  Foreign  Relations  hung  en 
gravings  of  the  Treaty  of  Westphalia,  the  Congress  of 
Vienna,  the  Congress  of  Paris,  the  Declaration  of 
Independence,  and  Penn's  Treaty  with  the  Indians. 
Round  these  as  centres  were  others  which  claimed 
connection  with  them,  as  a  bust  of  the  first  Napoleon 
placed  near  the  Congress  of  Paris,  and  the  portraits  of 
Grotius  and  his  wife,  which  kept  company  with  the 


SUMMER  AT  HOME.  303 

Congress  of  Vienna.  Among  the  several  engravings 
of  Burke  which  hung  in  this  room  was  one  which  was 
sometimes  mistaken  for  a  portrait  of  Sumner  himself, 
to  which  he  often  called  attention  for  this  reason.  In 
like  manner  the  staircase  was  hung  with  the  pictures 
of  beautiful  stairways  ;  "  so  that  as  you  go  up  my  poor 
stairs,  you  can  imagine  you  are  on  any  of  these  grand 
stairways ;  this  is  only  a  sort  of  ladder  after  all,"  said 
their  owner.  At  the  head  of  these  same  stairs  hung 
photographs  of  the  Giotti  gates,  the  facade  of  the 
Louvre,  the  grand  staircase  at  Versailles.  "  See," 
said  Mr.  Sumner  on  one  occasion,  "  here  are  three 
perfect  things.  I  do  not  remember  ever  to  have  seen 
them  criticised ;  when  I  come  home  from  the  Senate 
tired  and  cross,  I  like  to  look  at  these ;  it  comforts 
one  to  think  there  is  something  perfect,  something 
that  has  never  been  criticised." 

But  more  than  all  the  rare  engravings  on  his  walls 
and  all  the  exquisite  china  which  he  prized  so  highly, 
did  Mr.  Sumner  love  his  autographs;  and  well  he 
might.  There  were  letters  from  Mine,  de  SeVigne, 
Southey,  Mary  Somerville,  Sydney  Smith,  Harriet 
Martineau,  Mrs.  Shelley,  Thackeray,  Dickens,  and  all 
the  lights  of  the  world  of  contemporary  letters.  Some 
of  his  autographs  were  presentation  copies  of  contem 
porary  engravings ;  some  were  books  sent  to  him  by 
famous  authors  in  many  languages  and  on  many  sub 
jects.  Here  was  the  original  score  of  an  opera ;  there 
was  a  diploma  of  the  College  of  Padua.  The  guest- 
book  of  an  Italian  nobleman  in  1600  contained  a 
couplet  written  by  one  John  Milton.  There  was 
Bunyan's  Bible  and  Milton's  annotated  Pindar  and 


304  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

John  Adams'  copy  of  the  Federalist.  There  was 
Melancthon's  Horace,  and  a  pocket  Testament  which 
belonged  to  Racine,  the  proof-sheets  of  the  "  Essay 
on  Man,"  and  a  copy  of  Erasmus  wherein  Holbein 
had  made  little  sketches  on  the  margin.  It  seemed 
as  if  there  were  no  end  of  these  written  tokens  of 
history.  Mr.  Sumner  enjoyed  these  treasures  with  all 
the  genuine  delight  of  a  collector  and  all  the  sim 
plicity  of  his  peculiar,  somewhat  childlike  satisfaction ; 
he  was  in  the  habit  of  exhibiting  these  to  his  friends  or 
those  who  would  appreciate  them ;  and  it  was  hard  to 
tell  who  most  enjoyed  the  fast-flying  hours,  the  sur 
prised  and  delighted  visitor  or  the  host  so  full  of 
knowledge  on  every  point,  and  so  running  over  with 
anecdotes  suggested  by  his  possessions. 

In  the  midst  of  these,  his  household  gods,  Sumner 
lived  and  worked  ;  for  if  his  house  was  in  some  ways 
a  gallery,  in  others  it  was  a  workshop.  His  study 
was  heaped  with  books  and  papers  thrown  down  in 
promiscuous  piles  until  at  some  times  it  was  difficult 
to  move  about  among  them.  His  long  hours  of  work 
scarcely  sufficed  for  what  he  must  do,  and  especially 
for  the  correspondence  to  which  he  was  so  faithful. 
It  was  at  this  period  that  he  began  the  interminable 
labour  of  publishing  his  Works ;  and  not  only  his  own 
secretary,  but  the  Librarian  of  Congress,  attest  the 
enormous  pains  he  took  that  the  edition  should  be 
both  complete  and  accurate.  Nine  volumes  were 
published  when  he  died,  and  three  more  were  in  his 
desk.  The  other  three  his  executors  completed.  In 
this  house  Sumner  gathered  his  friends  about  him. 
All  distinguished  foreigners  brought  letters  to  him; 


SUMNER  AT  HOME.  305 

and  whoever  they  were,  they  were  certainly  his  guests 
in  some  fashion.  Especially  were  his  dinners  famous 
for  all  that  dinners  should  be.  Longfellow  wrote  him, 
"  One  returning  traveller  reports  that  you  are  the 
leader  of  the  Senate,  and  have  more  influence  than 
any  man  there.  Another  reports  that  you  have  the 
best  cook  in  Washington  !  "  Certainly  he  gathered 
around  his  table,  to  test  the  quality  of  that  cook,  all 
the  cream  of  the  great  world,  all  that  was  best  in  that 
brilliant  society  of  which  Mr.  Sumner  was  so  large  a 
part.  A  charming  host,  found  these  guests  gathered 
often  from  more  than  one  country ;  but  they  had 
need  to  be  good  listeners,  for  once  started  on  one  of 
those  topics  so  interesting  to  him,  he  was  wont  to 
monopolize  the  talk.  There  was  not  much  play  of 
words  and  little  lightness  of  touch  in  those  mono 
logues,  but  in  every  other  sense  they  were  brilliant 
beyond  their  kind.  And  that  dinner- table  was  notable 
in  another  way,  —  it  never  heard  broad  story  or  doubt 
ful  jest,  and  its  repartee  was  altogether  delicate. 

Among  all  the  dinners  ever  given  in  that  house, 
none  were  more  extraordinary  than  the  double  enter 
tainment  to  the  Pligh  Joint  Commission  for  the  settle 
ment  of  the  "Alabama  "  claims,  which  took  on  an  as 
pect  more  public  than  private.  Perhaps  nothing  shows 
more  clearly  Senator  Sumner's  phenomenal  influence 
in  foreign  affairs  than  this  incident.  The  gentlemen  on 
this  commission  found  Charles  Sumner  deposed  from 
his  position,  and  officially  without  any  connection  what 
ever  with  our  foreign  affairs ;  and  yet  it  was  to  him  they 
went  for  advice,  suggestion,  counsel  of  every  kind.  No 
one  person,  neither  General  Grant  nor  Secretary  Fish, 
20 


306  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

much  less  Senator  Simon  Cameron,  who  had  suc 
ceeded  Sumner  at  the  head  of  the  Foreign  Relations 
Committee,  had  so  much  to  do  with  the  positions 
taken  or  the  result  obtained  as  this  man,  whose  house 
became  in  some  sort  a  centre  for  the  English  portion 
of  the  commission.  In  the  course  of  their  deliber 
ations  there  occurred  a  singular  and  most  significant 
incident.  The  commission  itself  caused  it  to  be 
understood  that  it  would  be  glad  to  accept  entertain 
ment  at  the  hands  of  Mr.  Sumner,  and  he  accordingly 
gave  them  a  dinner  for  the  completeness  of  which  he 
spared  no  pains  or  trouble.  It  was  notable  for  the 
delicacy  of  its  menu  and  the  rare  wines.  After  it, 
was  served  mandarin  tea,  which  the  Countess  de  Grey 
recognized  as  the  same  tea  she  had  tasted  at  Windsor 
Castle,  —  a  priceless  gift  which  Mr.  Sumner  received 
from  the  Chinese  minister.  But  after  all  is  said,  it 
was  only  a  dinner  among  dinners.  The  extraordinary 
fact  was  that  the  commission  came  back  again  to 
dinner  the  next  night.  This  time  they  came  with 
out  their  ladies,  and  they  stayed  late  into  the  night. 
There  was  little  preparation  for  the  dinner  itself,  but 
the  deliberations  of  that  evening  were  long  and  pro 
found.  Their  effect  upon  the  differences  which  had 
already  arisen  cannot  be  calculated.  Such  was  more 
than  once  the  nature  of  Sumner's  greatest  service,  — 
his  personal  influence  over  the  statesmen  of  other 
countries  as  well  as  his  own,  men  who  had  been  his 
friends  for  many  years ;  an  influence  which,  as  it  ap 
peared  in  this  case,  was  wholly  independent  of  place 
or  power. 


CIVIL  RIGHTS  BILL.  3° 7 


CHAPTER   XXVII. 

1870-1872. 

CIVIL    RIGHTS     BILL.  LIBERAL     MOVEMENT.  —  SPEECH 

AGAINST    GRANT. RE-ELECTION    OF    GRANT.  —  TRIP 

TO    EUROPE. 

ALTHOUGH  for  a  time  the  interest  of  Charles  Sumner's 
career  was  centred  round  a  different  class  of  affairs, 
its  main  purpose  was  not  changed.  For  four  years  he 
laboured  in  season  and  out  of  season  to  secure  to  the 
negro  those  civil  rights  which  throughout  the  Southern 
states  were  everywhere  denied  him.  In  May,  1870, 
he  introduced  his  famous  Civil  Rights  bill,  in  its  first 
form  a  repetition  and  enlargement  of  a  measure  pre 
pared  by  his  colleague  Henry  Wilson  five  years  be 
fore.  But  notwithstanding  his  repeated  efforts,  — 
efforts  which  must  have  sometimes  recalled  his  early 
experience  when  anti-slavery  measures  could  find  no 
place  on  the  calendar,  —  he  could  not  get  the  bill 
considered  for  more  than  a  year,  and  then  only  by  a 
parliamentary  stratagem.  The  appearance  of  a  bill 
removing  the  legal  and  political  disabilities  which  the 
Fourteenth  Amendment  imposed  upon  the  late  rebels, 
became  Sumner's  opportunity.  Justice  first,  generosity 
afterward,  was  his  cry  ;  and  he  offered  the  Civil  Rights 
bill  as  an  amendment  to  the  Amnesty  act.  If  the 
disloyal  white  citizen  was  to  have  all  his  old  political 


308  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

rights,  the  loyal  coloured  citizen  should  have  all  his 
new  civil  rights,  was  the  Senator's  stern  logic,  and  he 
determined  the  Senate  should  face  that  question.  As 
often  as  he  offered  the  amendment,  it  was  voted 
down ;  as  often  as  amnesty  was  proposed  without  it, 
that  was  refused. 

The  opposition  to  the  measure  came  from  two 
sources  :  from  those  reconvened  but  not  reconstructed 
rebels  who  were  repeating  in  the  Senate  of  1870  the 
arguments  of  1860,  and  from  those  Northern  senators 
who  sympathized  strongly  with  Sumner's  purpose,  but 
doubted  or  denied  the  constitutional  right  to  grant 
what  he  asked.  Political  rights  were  an  affair  of  the 
nation,  —  we  had  settled  that  in  blood  and  fire ;  but 
civil  rights,  —  where  did  the  Constitution  permit  the 
nation  to  interfere  with  the  local  concerns  of  the 
states?  Not  without  reason  such  men  as  Trumbull 
and  Carpenter  and  Frelinghuysen,  with  the  majority 
of  their  associates,  felt  that  we  could  not  do  in  times 
of  peace  what  we  had  done  as  a  military  necessity. 
To  Sumner  these  were  of  course  meaningless  objec 
tions.  When  the  equality  of  human  beings  was  in 
question,  he  never  stopped  for  legal  barriers.  If  the 
Constitution  did  not  sanction  these  measures,  the  De 
claration  of  Independence  did ;  and  once  more  he 
called  upon  the  Senate  to  interpret  the  Constitution 
by  the  Declaration,  and  this  time  he  declared  the  two 
"  co-ordinate  authorities,"  while  he  called  those  men 
traitors  to  liberty  whose  consciences  refused  assent  to 
his  position.  In  all  this  Sumner  was  evidently  con 
sistent  with  his  past.  It  was  on  the  basis  of  the  De 
claration  of  Independence  that  he  claimed  the  right 


CIVIL   RIGHTS  BILL.  309 

of  emancipation.  He  always  spurned  the  idea  that 
our  right  to  free  the  slave  was  the  right  of  war ;  and 
he  claimed  the  same  right  of  protection  that  he  had 
of  emancipation,  scorning  the  idea  that  we  must 
abide  by  the  Constitution  in  such  a  case.  Whether 
the  one  or  the  other  course  would  have  been  the 
wiser,  it  is  still  after  twenty  years  too  early  to  deter 
mine.  There  are  those  who  believe  that  some  meas 
ure  of  civil  rights  stronger  than  that  finally  put  upon 
our  statute-books  in  1875,  would  have  prevented  a 
difficulty  that  still  haunts  us  ;  others  point  to  the  judi 
cial  complications  and  practical  difficulties  in  en 
forcing  that  measure  as  a  proof  of  the  uselessness  of 
law  unsupported  by  public  sentiment.  But  be  the 
fact  as  it  may,  to  Sumner  it  was  enough  to  pass 
the  law.  With  that,  the  deed  was  accomplished  in 
his  mind.  He  believed  the  negro  problem  would  be 
solved  when  the  law  beheld  white  and  black  with 
equal  rights  in  all  public  places ;  and  he  held  that  the 
nation  possessed,  by  the  double  right  of  original  title 
and  of  conquest,' the  power  to  give  him  that  equal 
place.  Men  will  judge  Sumner  here,  as  through  his 
career,  very  much  according  to  the  temper  of  their 
own  minds.  To  those  who  believe  that  constitutions 
and  laws  must  be  obeyed  by  nations,  his  view  will 
seem  grandly  mistaken,  a  great  impossibility ;  but  to 
those  who  believe  that  all  law  must  stand  aside  before 
human  rights,  he.  will  seem  a  hero,  and  to  oppose 
him  a  crime.  The  first  think  him  a  prophet  lead 
ing  men  toward  the  light ;  the  last,  a  lawgiver  baffled 
and  defeated  by  the  powers  of  this  world. 

The   speeches  in  which  the  Senator  defended  his 


310  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

position  during  the  long  debate,  which  lasted  indeed 
until  after  his  death,  are  perfect  "  armouries  of  infor 
mation  "  on  the  subject.  The  reader  who  wishes  to  see 
what  justification  Sumner  had,  what  urgent  need  he 
felt,  cannot  do  better  than  to  study  those  orations,  — 
the  last  and  by  no  means  the  least  effort  for  the  black 
man  of  his  greatest  champion,  who  died  with  scarcely  a 
sight  of  the  promised  land.  Time  and  trials  had  not 
served  to  make  him  more  temperate  in  his  speech,  how 
ever,  and  both  in  debate  and  in  the  longer  speeches 
he  was  severe  beyond  endurance.  Thus  in  every 
direction  he  widened  the  breach  with  his  party  which 
was  soon  to  become  a  chasm. 

The  month  of  January,  1871,  saw  the  admission  of 
the  congressmen  for  Georgia ;  and  for  the  first  time 
since  December,  1860,  —  a  full  ten  years,  —  every  state 
was  represented  in  that  body.  The  presidential  elec 
tion  was  already  casting  its  shadows  before,  and  at 
this  early  date  Sumner  expressed  his  views  in  a  series 
of  resolutions  to  amend  the  Constitution  in  such  wise 
as  to  limit  the  presidency  to  a  single  term,  —  resolu 
tions  with  a  preamble  so  elaborate  that  it  amounted 
to  a  speech,  citing  all  the  historical  allusions  which 
bore  on  the  question.  From  that  time  onward,  all 
the  acts  of  the  administration,  and  of  the  Republican 
party  as  well,  were  seen  by  Sumner  through  the 
medium  of  his  prejudice.  This  was  especially  the 
case  in  the  great  debate  over  the  question  whether 
we  had  violated  neutrality  in  furnishing  arms  to  France, 
—  that  drawn  battle  of  oratory  between  Morton  and 
Schurz,  —  when  Sumner  made  a  lengthy  speech  some 
what  heavily  weighted  with  these  same  prejudices. 


LIBERAL  MOVEMENT.  311 

Sumner's  course  agninst  Grant  derived  its  chief  ef 
fect  from  its  relation  to  the  political  contest  then  go 
ing  on.  The  split  inside  the  Republican  ranks  proved 
of  formidable  proportions.  Overweening  personal 
ambitions  on  the  part  of  prominent  leaders  —  notably 
some  of  the  great  senators  —  inevitably  created  ani 
mosities,  since  they  were  insurmountable  obstacles  to 
other  personal  ambitions  which  had  no  room  to  grow. 
The  military  idea,  which  governed  President  Grant 
far  too  much,  created  an  opportunity  for  the  undue 
influence  of  those  few  men  whom  he  trusted.  These 
things  furnished  a  soil  in  which  the  seed  of  discontent 
brought  forth  a  hundred- fold.  The  discontent  itself 
came  from  different  causes.  There  was  a  not  small 
body  of  Republicans  who  honestly  believed  Grant  to 
be  personally  corrupt,  and  that  the  administration 
was  wrong  in  its  whole  position.  The  business  in 
terests  of  the  North  again  cried  out,  as  of  old  time, 
that  too  much  thought  was  spent  upon  the  negro,  and 
the  men  who  should  govern  the  South  were  its  old 
masters ;  from  them  the  commercial  North  might 
expect  a  market,  but  the  negro  had  no  business 
status.  Peace  would  mean  business,  —  it  was  gen 
erally  called  prosperity,  —  and  therefore  peace  was 
the  first  necessity.  The  negro  question  must  take 
care  of  itself.  Moreover,  those  Democrats  who  had 
supported  the  nation  during  the  war  had  almost  to  a 
man  returned  to  their  old  position  of  the  rightful 
power  of  the  state  over  its  local  affairs.  To  their 
mind,  Grant's  government  and  the  radical  element 
in  Congress  had  gone  much  too  far  in  their  control 
of  these  states.  In  very  truth,  the  tact  with  which 


312  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

Lincoln  had  held  all  these  forces  in  hand  had  been 
greatly  wanting ;  and  in  pursuing  our  most  difficult 
way,  we  had  gone  now  too  far  in  this  direction  and 
now  too  far  in  that,  —  we  had  gone  forward  when  we 
should  have  held  back,  and  lingered  where  progress 
was  a  necessity.  For  a  variety  of  reasons,  both  good 
and  bad,  there  was  much  dissatisfaction  with  Grant 
himself;  and  Sumner  had  done  his  share  in  pro 
moting  the  dissatisfaction.  Thus  many  things  com 
bined  to  bring  about  what  was  known  for  no  dis 
coverable  reason  as  the  "  Liberal  "  movement.  Mis 
souri  took  the  initiative  ;  New  York  once  more  — 
should  we  not  say,  as  always  ?  —  rolled  off  upon  the 
country  her  local  quarrels ;  and  Massachusetts,  char 
acteristically  eager  for  new  departures  in  politics,  lent 
much  strength  to  the  movement.  By  the  irony  of 
fate,  however,  the  favourite  sons  of  all  these  cliques 
were  thrown  over  for  Horace  Greeley  and  Gratz 
Brown,  —  the  one  representing  all  that  this  collection 
of  ambitious  politicians  did  not  believe  in,  the  other 
a  triumph  of  a  defeated  element.  Although  Sumner 
was  in  no  sense  a  candidate,  and  indeed  announced 
himself  as  in  favour  of  Lyman  Trumbull,  there  is  little 
doubt  that  he  ardently  desired  this  nomination  him 
self.  He  was  conspicuously  mentioned  for  the  place, 
and  felt  it  his  due,  as  he  had  done  four  years  before. 

But  before  he  finally  crossed  the  political  Rubicon 
on  the  hither  side  of  which  were  the  associations  of  a 
lifetime,  he  made  a  speech  which  he  believed  would 
give  a  new  candidate  to  the  Republican  party,  and 
enable  him  at  least  to  take  his  old  position  as  one  of 
its  leaders.  On  the  last  day  of  May,  1872,  he  inter- 


SPEECH  AGAINST  GRANT. 

jected  into  the  deliberations  of  the  Senate  a  direct 
attack  upon  President  Grant,  —  going  far  out  of  his 
way  to  seek  an  opportunity,  so  that  he  chose  for  an 
occasion  a  miscellaneous  appropriation  bill.  His  re 
marks  bore  not  the  remotest  connection  with  the 
business  in  hand ;  they  were  no  more  the  direct  con 
cern  of  the  Senate  than  the  nomination  for  Gov 
ernor  of  Massachusetts.  In  every  particular  it  was  a 
stump  speech,  and  that  of  the  most  violent  and  viru 
lent  sort.  In  form  it  was  a  recital  of  the  complaints 
against  Grant;  and  its  very  weakness  discloses  the 
weakness  of  the  opposition  to  him.  Mr.  Sumner's 
most  ardent  admirers  can  but  regret  its  diatribes,  as 
they  deplored  the  form  of  his  attacks  upon  President 
Johnson.  He  arraigned  the  character  and  purposes 
of  Grant,  went  far  afield  to  discover  in  the  most 
trivial  and  natural  circumstances  the  evidence  of 
Cfesarism,  declared  the  mistakes  growing  out  of 
ignorance  or  a  soft  heart  to  be  crimes,  and  dealt 
with  the  faults  of  the  President  with  inquisitorial 
severity.  President  Grant  was  charged  in  a  charac 
teristic  climax  with  violating  the  Constitution,  dis 
regarding  international  law,  and  offering  indignity 
to  the  African  race.  All  the  deeds  of  his  adminis 
tration  were  condemned  in  unsparing  terms,  and  in 
terpreted  with  little  regard  to  the  real  situation ;  and 
always,  in  every  category  of  complaint,  the  last  and 
crowning  outrage  was  San  Domingo.  But  as  if  it  was 
not  enough  to  charge  him  with  all  political  high 
crimes,  the  angry  Senator  added  also  charges  of  per 
sonal  corruption  expressed  in  every  fashion,  —  not 
omitting  those  vulgar  touches  to  which  Sumner  was 


CHARLES  SUMNER. 

so  liable  under  the  influence  of  passion.  As  Mr. 
Sumner  left  the  Capitol  for  his  house,  he  said  to  one 
of  his  colleagues,  "  I  have  to-day  made  the  renomi- 
nation  of  Grant  impossible ;  "  so  little  did  he  realize 
his  own  position  or  the  temper  of  the  country.  Two 
weeks  later,  the  Republican  convention  at  Philadel 
phia  renominated  Grant  without  a  single  dissenting 
vote.  And  to  his  name  they  added  that  of  Henry 
Wilson  of  Massachusetts,  Sumner's  own  colleague  in 
the  Senate  and  lifelong  companion  in  the  anti- slavery 
cause.  Another  month,  and  the  Democrats  had  ac 
cepted  the  situation  as  their  one  chance  of  success, 
and  adopted  both  the  candidates  and  the  platform  of 
the  Liberal  Republicans.  In  the  end,  it  is  true,  the 
usual  result  came  about,  and  the  larger  and  more 
coherent  Democratic  party  absorbed  the  widely  sepa 
rated  and  loosely  held  elements  of  the  "  Liberal  " 
party  into  an  organic  connection  never  since  lost. 
But  at  first  the  question  was  between  the  old  Repub 
lican  party,  known  as  the  "  Stalwarts,"  against  a  new 
Democracy  containing  the  most  radical  element  from 
the  Republican  ranks.  Such  are  the  paradoxes  of 
political  history,  brought  about  by  that  personal  ele 
ment  which  is  the  largest  factor  in  all  governmental 
annals. 

If  Sumner  hesitated  at  the  alternative  presented,  it 
was  but  a  momentary  and  trifling  hesitation.  With 
all  his  heart  he  believed  in  those  days  that  the  con 
tinuance  of  President  Grant  in  his  high  office  meant 
ruin  to  the  country ;  and  carried  away  by  the  specious 
doctrine  then  first  made  into  a  platform,  that  men  were 
better  than  principles,  he  believed  that  Greeley  at  the 


TRIP  TO  EUROPE.  3*5 

head  of  that  Democratic  party  he  had  so  often  and 
so  violently  denounced  was  better  than  Grant  at  the 
head  of  the  Republican  party  led  by  men  who  were 
his  personal  enemies,  and  whom  he  believed  danger 
ous  to  the  country.  He  announced  himself  in  an 
open  letter  addressed  to  the  coloured  voters,  advising 
them  to  vote  for  Greeley,  and  declaring  that  the 
success  of  the  Democratic  party  at  this  time  would 
not  be  in  any  sense  a  Democratic  success,  but  the 
"  inauguration  of  Republican  principles  under  the  safe 
guard  of  a  Republican  President  and  Republican  Vice- 
President,  With  Democrats  as  avowed  supporters.'* 
For  the  rest,  this  declaration  of  principles  was  in  the 
main  a  resume  of  his  speech  against  Grant ;  and  so 
in  great  measure  was  the  speech  which  he  prepared 
for  a  campaign  speech  in  Faneuil  Hall,  but  which  was 
never  delivered.  In  this  last,  however,  he  devoted 
considerable  space  to  the  effort  to  prove  his  own 
political  consistency  in  the  matter,  and  the  good  faith 
and  future  promise  of  his  old  enemies,  the  Demo 
crats  and  rebels. 

Sumner's  friends,  wiser  than  he,  persuaded  him  to 
make  his  failing  strength  an  excuse  to  leave  the  cam 
paign  and  go  to  Europe,  —  making  up  a  purse  for 
that  purpose,  it  is  said  \  and  he  spent  the  autumn  in 
what  proved  a  last  visit  to  his  old  haunts  in  France 
and  England.  During  his  absence  his  new  political 
friends  accepted  the  logic  of  his  position,  and  nomi 
nated  him  as  the  Democratic  and  Liberal  candidate 
for  Governor  of  Massachusetts.  It  was  an  honour 
speedily  declined.  He  returned  in  November,  just  as 
the  election  had  closed,  —  a  contest  in  some  of  its 


CHARLES  SUMNER. 

aspects  one  of  the  most  extraordinary  in  our  history. 
Only  six  states  voted  for  Greeley.  The  most  sanguine 
Republican  scarcely  hoped  for  such  a  success.  How 
little  Sumner  expected  it,  was  seen  in  a  private  con 
versation  shortly  before  he  sailed.  He  sought  an 
opportunity  to  ask  a  prominent  Massachusetts  official 
near  the  President  as  to  the  chances  of  the  election, 
and  was  answered  that  there  was  no  doubt  of  Grant's 
election.  He  threw  up  his  hands  in  surprise  and 
said,  "  You  and  Wilson  are  the  only  two  men  who 
tell  me  it  is  possible  !  "  But  he  lived  to  change  his 
position.  What  influenced  him  cannot  be  told ;  but 
shortly  before  his  death  he  said  to  a  Republican 
congressman  from  his  own  state,  with  whom  he  had 
long  held  most  intimate  relations,  "I  have  changed 
my  views  about  Grant."  And  on  another  occasion  he 
repeated  to  the  same  friend  what  he  said  more  than 
once  to  others :  "  I  have  come  back ;  I  have  come 
back  to  stick.  There  is  no  safety  for  this  Republic 
except  in  the  Republican  party." 


CENSURE  BY  MASSACHUSETTS.  317 


CHAPTER  XXVIII. 

1872-1874. 

CENSURE  BY  MASSACHUSETTS  LEGISLATURE. ILLNESS. 

QUIET   LIFE. 

THERE  was  but  one  more  event  in  Charles  Sumner's 
career;  the  rest  were  only  episodes.  This  added  an 
other  and  a  very  heavy  weight  to  the  burden  of  disap 
pointment  he  had  to  carry.  Immediately  upon  the 
meeting  of  the  Forty-second  Congress  he  offered  a 
resolution  in  the  following  words  :  — 

"  Whereas  the  National  unity  and  good-will  among 
fellow-citizens  can  be  assured  only  through  oblivion  of 
past  differences,  and  it  is  contrary  to  the  usage  of  civilized 
nations  to  perpetuate  the  memory  of  civil  war  :  Therefore, 

"  Be  it  enacted  by  the  Senate  and  House  of  Repre 
sentatives  of  the  United  States  in  Congress  assembled, 
That  the  names  of  battles  with  fellow-citizens  shall  not  be 
continued  in  the  Army  Register  or  placed  on  the  regi 
mental  colours  of  the  United  States." 

What  motives  moved  this  action  it  is  difficult  to 
say.  Doubtless  they  were  mixed,  as  is  the  wont 
with  men.  His  old  advocacy  of  peace  returned; 
the  hatred  of  Grant,  who  had  won  these  battles,  then 
regnant  within  him  ;  his  consistency  as  an  advocate  of 
Greeley  and  conciliation ;  his  own  belief  that  he  never 


3*8  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

cherished  an  animosity ;  certain  historical  precedents, 
—  these  or  other  motives  may  have  entered  in.  What 
ever  induced  him  to  offer  such  a  measure,  a  curious 
incident  is  told  of  the  immediate  occasion.  One  of 
his  old  and  close  friends  in  Washington,  himself  a 
Massachusetts  man,  was  sitting  beside  him  in  the 
Senate  on  that  day.  The  Senator,  looking  through 
his  desk,  came  upon  this  measure,  which  in  substance 
he  had  offered  ten  years  before.  Major  Poore,  much 
pleased  with  the  idea,  suggested  he  should  offer  it 
again  then  and  there,  which  he  accordingly  did.  Thus 
almost  by  chance  he  mortally  offended  his  state,  for 
the  commonwealth  of  Massachusetts  was  in  no  con 
ciliatory  mood  in  those  days.  Two  or  three  years 
later  she  had  herself  forgotten  the  difference  between 
treason  and  loyalty,  and  made  haste  to  proclaim  the 
fact;  but  in  1872  the  day  of  Northern  honours  for 
rebel  soldiers  had  not  arrived,  and  her  Legislature  was 
hot  with  rage  at  a  proposition  that  these  memorials  to 
the  glory  and  sacrifice  of  her  slaughtered  sons  should 
be  destroyed  by  the  nation  they  had  saved ;  and  for 
the  same  reason  Massachusetts  still  honoured  Grant, 
and  was  disposed  to  show  her  abhorrence  of  those  in 
her  borders  who  had  rejected  him ;  and  in  particular 
it  was  a  not-to-be-neglected  opportunity  to  punish  the 
apostate  Senator.  Accordingly  the  Massachusetts  Leg 
islature  made  hot  haste  to  pass  a  vote  of  censure  upon 
Charles  Sumner  for  the  battle-flags  resolution,  —  an 
action  absolutely  without  warrant  by  any  theory  of 
representation  current  in  New  England,  and  absolutely 
without  excuse  in  its  wanton  cruelty,  its  futile  and 
petty  revenge.  In  justice  to  the  state  of  Massachu- 


CENSURE   BV  MASSACHUSETTS.  319 

setts  it  must  be  said  that  Sumner  was  somewhat 
over- sensitive  in  the  matter.  The  text  of  the  reso 
lution,  after  relating  in  the  preamble  that  a  bill  of  this 
character  had  been  introduced  by  a  senator  from  Mas 
sachusetts,  and  declaring  that  such  a  bill  would  be  an 
insult  to  "the  loyal  soldiery  of  the  nation,"  pro 
ceeded  in  these  words,  "  Therefore  resolved,  That 
such  legislation  meets  the  unqualified  condemnation 
of  the  people  of  Massachusetts." 

The  censure  was  by  implication  only,  and  the 
offence  was  chiefly  against  the  whole  republican  the 
ory  of  legislative  duty.  Nevertheless,  it  was  felt  as  it 
was  meant  to  be  felt,  as  a  personal  matter,  and  touched 
Suroner  in  one  of  his  most  sensitive  nerves,  —  his 
pride  in  the  state  of  Massachusetts.  That  state  shortly 
realized  that  she  had  chiefly  censured  herself  in  her 
action,  and  a  new  Legislature  undid  the  work  of  its 
predecessor.  In  January,  1874,  acting  upon  the  peti 
tions  of  all  the  public  men  of  prominence  in  the  state, 
the  Legislature  formally  "  rescinded  and  annulled  "  the 
proceeding  of  the  two  years  before.  The  news  of 
this  action  reached  Mr.  Sumner  in  the  very  last  days 
of  his.  life,  and  gave  him  a  pleasure  which  cannot  be 
estimated  except  by  the  measure  of  his  own  sense  of 
the  wrong  done  him. 

In  the  spring  of  1873,  he  was  granted  the  divorce 
he  had  been  seeking  for  a  year  or  two,  and  his  do 
mestic  romance  was  officially  broken,  as  it  had  been 
practically  so  long  before.  It  made  absolutely  no 
change  in  the  life  he  was  leading,  and  was  of  interest 
to  the  public  then,  as  to  his  biographer  now,  only  as  one 
of  those  cardinal  facts  which  could  not  be  ignored. 


320  CHARLES  SUMMER. 

His  extravagant  taste  for  bric-a-brac  had  been  grati 
fied  largely  by  his  lectures,  and  he  frequently  exhib 
ited  one  and  another  treasure  as  the  result  of  this 
lecture  or  that  address.  These  expensive  amusements, 
and  losses  in  part  occasioned  by  the  Boston  fire,  had 
left  him  some  ten  thousand  dollars  in  arrears,  and  he 
proposed  to  spend  the  summer  of  1873  in  mending 
his  broken  fortunes  by  a  lecture  tour ;  but  the  faithful 
friends  who  stood  so  closely  around  him  in  any  finan 
cial  crisis,  came  to  his  rescue  with  a  gift  of  so  liberal 
a  character  that  this  became  unnecessary.  In  these 
the  last  months  of  his  career,  Sumner  led  a  more  quiet 
life  than  had  fallen  to  his  lot  since  he  first  entered 
upon  the  public  service.  There  were  weeks  when  he 
went  to  the  Senate  very  little,  but  occupied  himself 
with  his  books,  his  correspondence,  and  his  friends. 
Angina  pectoris  had  clutched  his  heart,  and  the 
strongest  remedies  only  fought  it  off  for  the  time 
being.  He  hesitated  to  endure  the  severe  treatment 
which  Dr.  Brown- Se"quard  proposed,  and  said  sadly, 
"  I  have  suffered  a  great  deal."  His  health  did  not 
permit  much  action  or  excitement.  Neglected  by 
the  Senate  and  snubbed  by  the  administration,,  there 
was  little  place  for  him  in  the  national  councils, 
while  his  own  state  had  hurt  him  in  every  fibre  of  his 
sensitive  nature.  His  voice  was  occasionally  heard  in 
the  Senate,  it  is  true,  but  for  the  most  part  to  gather 
up  the  threads  of  half-done  work.  The  Civil  Rights 
bill  still  claimed  his  attention ;  he  spoke  for  his  be 
loved  Boston  and  for  suffering  Memphis,  devastated 
by  fire  and  fever ;  he  appeared  in  print  occasionally 
on  behalf  of  the  coloured  race ;  he  eulogized  a  dead 


QUIET  LIFE.  321 

associate  now  and  then ;  and  although  his  published 
works  make  no  mention  of  it,  his  last  speech  in  the 
Senate  a  day  or  two  before  his  death  was  to  favour  a 
Centennial  celebration  which  should  be  national  and 
American,  not  international  and  European.  Thus, 
after  a  somewhat  subdued  fashion,  this  stormy  life 
ended,  —  not  altogether  in  sunshine. 


21 


322  CHARLES  SUMNER. 


CHAPTER  XXIX. 
1874. 

DEATH    AND    BURIAL. 

THE  end  came  suddenly  and  almost  without  warning. 
On  Tuesday  night,  March  10,  1874,  Mr.  Sumner  was 
seized  with  a  violent  attack  of  angina  pectoris.  It 
was  by  no  means  an  unusual  thing,  for  the  slightest 
disturbance  of  mind  or  body  would  bring  on  the 
agony  in  those  enfeebled  days.  The  pleasurable 
excitement  produced  by  the  action  of  the  Massa 
chusetts  Legislature  disturbed  the  motions  of  his 
heart,  and  a  slight  indigestion  following  his  dinner 
aggravated  the  trouble.  The  occasion  was  im 
material  ;  for  so  strong  was  the  disease  lying  in 
wait  for  his  every  unguarded  motion,  and  so  feeble 
the  resistance  his  weakened  body  could  offer,  that 
the  length  of  his  life  was  almost  a  measurable 
quantity;  the  occasion  of  his  death  should  be  this 
or  that,  as  might  befall.  He  was  scarcely  more  than 
twelve  hours  in  dying,  and  amid  much  and  extreme 
bodily  suffering  his  mind  reverted  with  equal  pain  to 
his  unfinished  labours  on  the  Civil  Rights  bill  and  to 
the  Works  which  he  intended  for  his  monument.  On 
the  nth  of  March  Charles  Sumner  died,  a  little  more 
than  sixty-three  years  old.  The  impersonality  of  his 


DEATH  AND  BURIAL.  323 

life  and  his  curiously  isolated  position  were  patheti 
cally  illustrated  in  this  death-bed,  at  which  a  nation 
mourned,  but  where  family  tears  were  wanting ;  where 
public  issues  were  the  last  thought,  and  private  ties 
were  forgotten. 

His  funeral  was  one  long  tribute  and  "  pageant  of 
woe."  Beginning  with  that  stateliest  and  most  solemn 
of  our  national  ceremonies,  a  funeral  in  the  Senate- 
chamber,  he  was  honoured  in  the  place  which  he  had 
so  long  honoured,  by  the  presence  of  the  govern 
ment  itself,  waiting  upon  death  with  a  grief  which  was 
genuine,  and  an  admiration  which  remembered  the 
glorious  past  and  forgot  the  less  happy  present.  He 
was  attended  by  men  of  national  fame  all  the  way  to 
the  city  of  his  birth ;  and  there  the  mortal  frame  was 
delivered  to  the  state  which,  with  all  her  vagaries,  was 
always  so  proud  of  him,  and  which  received  the  sacred 
trust  with  all  the  pomp  and  circumstance  she  could 
devise.  Grief,  public  and  personal,  was  not  wanting ; 
and  it  was  the  common  people  who  mourned  most 
and  most  sincerely  this  great  aristocrat,  who  was 
yet  the  champion  and  defender  of  a  despised  race. 
The  commonwealth  expressed  her  grief  and  sorrow 
in  public  ceremony  and  eulogy;  the  Congress  did 
him  like  honour.  Connected  with  these  last  eulogies 
was  a  dramatic  incident  of  which  much  has  been 
made,  but  whose  true  history  was  more  striking  and 
instructive  than  the  public  ever  has  known.  Among 
the  members  of  the  House  of  Representatives  who 
begged  as  a  privilege  the  opportunity  to  say  some 
thing  in  eulogy  of  Mr.  Sumner  was  L.  Q.  C.  Lamar, 
of  Mississippi;  a  congressional  associate  of  Sumner 


324  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

before  the  war,  he  had  been  an  active  and  bitter  Con 
federate,  and  was  now  returned  to  his  former  position. 
That  he  should  wish  to  eulogize  the  great  anti- 
slavery  champion  seemed  a  noble  triumph  for  Sum- 
ner's  character.  But  only  those  within  the  inner 
circle  knew  that  this  somewhat  ostentatious  ad 
vocate  of  peace  and  fraternity  refused  to  speak  in 
the  order  of  his  assignment  because  that  order 
placed  him  after  a  coloured  congressman.  Nor 
could  anything  be  done  until  one  of  Simmer's  col 
leagues  quietly  changed  places  with  the  ex-slave 
owner,  and  himself  spoke  directly  after  Mr.  Rainey, 
leaving  to  Mr.  Lamar  the  opportunity  of  seconding 
the  resolution,  —  a  situation  more  to  his  mind.  If 
any  justification  was  needed  of  Sumner's  course  in 
reconstruction  matters,  and  his  distrust  of  rebel  pro 
fessions  of  justice  to  the  black  man,  it  was  furnished 
by  this  incident  of  his  own  burial. 

Sixty-three  years  this  man  had  lived  upon  earth. 
For  more  than  a  score  of  them  he  had  been  counted 
among  her  great  men,  with  what  reason  his  life  has 
shown.  A  child  of  New  England,  and  the  product 
of  her  traditions,  he  was  a  citizen  of  the  world ; 
a  scholar,  he  neglected  learning  that  he  might 
act  nobly  ;  a  statesman,  he  taught  his  country  that 
greatness  was  only  greatness  when  it  was  founded 
upon  justice ;  loving  the  praise  of  men,  he  cast  it 
aside  as  a  thing  of  no  worth  that  he  might  serve 
the  lowest  of  his  brethren ;  very  human,  he  made  of 
his  faults  an  offering,  and  hesitated  not  before  suffer 
ing,  and  welcomed  scorn,  if  so  be  these  were  the 
fiery  tokens  of  duty ;  a  man  of  eloquent  speech,  he 


DEATH  AND  BURIAL.  32$ 

trained  his  lips  to  speak  no  word  that  did  not  ex 
press  a  purpose  of  his  soul,  till  men  taunted  him 
with  his  constancy;  strong  for  the  right,  he  was 
fierce  against  wrong;  loving  liberty,  he  looked  nei 
ther  to  the  right  hand  nor  to  the  left,  but  pursued 
her  with  a  single  eye,  and  forgot  the  lions  in  the 
way  that  he  might  the  sooner  bring  his  people  to 
her  pleasant  paths ;  the  sworn  knight  of  righteous 
ness  and  freedom,  he  dallied  not  with  pleasure  nor 
hesitated  for  danger  :  all  things  were  his,  that  he 
might  use  them  for  mankind, — and  mankind  crowned 
him  with  great  glory,  and  laid  in  his  right  hand  the 
gift  of  fame. 

When  the  Senate  of  the  United  States  brought 
him  back  wrapped  in  honours  to  the  commonwealth 
of  Massachusetts,  the  most  eloquent  of  all  her  silver 
tongues  gave  up  the  sacred  charge,  in  words  that 
better  express  the  sum  of  Charles  Sumner's  life  than 
any  lesser  phrases  could  do.  In  the  State  House 
itself,  where  gather  all  the  traditibns  of  the  old 
commonwealth,  in  the  midst  of  her  officers,  and 
surrounded  by  the  distinguished  men  who  had  come 
on  that  solemn  errand,  Senator  Henry  B.  Anthony 
said,  — 

"  We  are  commanded  by  the  Senate  to  render  back  to 
you  your  illustrious  dead.  Nearly  a  quarter  of  a  century 
ago,  you  dedicated  to  the  public  service  a  man  who  was 
even  then  greatly  distinguished.  He  remained  in  it, 
quickening  its  patriotism,  informing  its  councils,  and 
leading  in  its  deliberations,  until,  having  survived  in  con 
tinuous  service  all  his  original  associates,  he  has  closed 
his  earthly  career.  With  reverent  hands  we  bring  to  you 


326  CHARLES  SUMNER. 

his  mortal  part,  that  it  may  be  committed  to  the  soil  of 
the  renowned  Commonwealth  that  gave  him  birth.  Take 
it;  it  is  yours. 

"  The  part  which  we  do  not  return  to  you  is  not  wholly 
yours  to  receive,  nor  altogether  ours  to  give.  It  belongs 
to  the  country,  to  freedom,  to  civilization,  to  humanity. 
We  come  to  you  with  the  emblems  of  mourning,  which 
faintly  typify  the  sorrow  which  dwells  in  the  breasts  they 
cover.  So  much  we  must  concede  to  the  infirmity  of 
human  nature  ;  but  in  the  view  of  reason  and  philosophy, 
is  it  not  rather  a  matter  of  high  exultation  that  a  life  so 
pure  in  its  personal  qualities,  so  lofty  in  its  public  aims, 
so  fortunate  in  the  fruition  of  noble  effort,  has  closed 
safely  without  a  stain,  before  age  had  impaired  its  intel 
lectual  vigour,  before  time  had  dimmed  the  lustre  of 
its  genius  ?  Our  mission  is  completed.  We  commit 
to  you  the  body  of  Charles  Sumner.  His  undying 
fame  the  Muse  of  History  has  already  taken  into  her 
keeping." 


INDEX. 


ADAMS,  C.  F.,  142, 151,  177 ;  Mrs. 

C.  F.,227;  C.F.,  Jr.,  142, 150; 

J.Q.,  8,68. 

"  Alabama  "  claims,  283-300. 
Alaska,  258-260. 
Alley,  J.  B.,  175. 
Amnesty,  251. 
Ancestors,  C.  Sumner,  3. 
Andrew,  J.  A.,  182. 
Anthony,  H.  B.,  325. 
Ashley,  J.  M.,  174, 192,  292,  293. 
Assassination  of  Lincoln,  217. 
Assault,  C.  Sumner,  113. 

BABCOCK,  O.  E.,  291,  294. 

Bancroft,  G.,  17,  39. 

Banks,  N.  P.,  88,  96,  122. 

Battle-flags  resolution,  317,  319. 

Benton,  T.  H.,  70,  88,  101. 

Birth,  C.  Sumner,  7. 

Black,  J.,  149,  152. 

Elaine,  J.  G.,  236,  242. 

Blair,  F.,  118,  142  ;  F.,  Jr.,  275  ; 

M.,  159,  204. 

Boston,  resolution  of  approval,  247. 
Boutwell,  G.  S.,  66. 
Bowles,  S.,  212. 

Breckenridge,  J.  C.,  88,  122,  140. 
Brooks,  P.,  113,  116, 145. 
Brown,  J.,  138. 
Brown-S6quard,  129,  320. 
Buchanan,  J.,  86,  141,  145. 
Burlingame.  A.  P.,  117. 
Butler,  A.  P.,  113,  145. 


CALHOUN,  J.  C.,  17,  101. 
Cass,  L.,  70,  86, 102, 111,112, 149. 
Channing,  W.  E.,  19;  W.  H.,  39. 
Chase,  S.  P.,  68,  70,  103, 159,  161, 

i73i  *74>  i93»  J9S,  199.  204,  222» 
267,  274;  K.  (Mrs.  Sprague), 
194,  275  ;  J.  (Mrs.  Hoyt),  221. 

Chief -Justice,  appointment  of,  193. 

Choate,  R.,  17,  39. 

Civil  rights,  307. 

Claflin,  W.,  175. 

Clarke,  J.  F.,  8. 

Clay,  H.,  17,  46,  70,  101. 

Cleveland,  H.  R.,  20,  35. 

Coalition,  65. 

Colorado,  250. 

Commissioner  U.  S.  Court,  C. 
Sumner,  18. 

Congress,  work  of,  etc.,  155,  244, 
265. 

Constitutional  amendments, — Thir 
teenth,  208 ;  Fourteenth,  243- 
253 ;  Fifteenth,  278-280. 

Constitutional  Convention,  Mass., 
87- 

DANA,  R.  H.,  106,  161,  176,  279. 
Davis,  J.,  70,  103,  114,  145,  146, 

220,  246. 

Dawes,  H.  L.,  171,  219. 
Death,  C.  Sumner,  322. 
District   of  Columbia,    negro   suf 
frage,  251. 
Divorce,  C.  Sumner,  264,  319. 


328 


INDEX. 


Douglas,   S.  A.,  70,  88,  108,  in, 

112,   121,   140. 

Drayton  and  Sayres,  77. 
Dred  Scott,  137. 

ELECTIONS,  C.  Sumner,   65-67, 

123,  124,  173-175,280.' 
Emancipation,  158,  178. 
Europe.    England,  22-33,  128,129, 

315;  France.  25,   30,    31,    128, 

130,  134  ,  Germany,  32;  Italy, 

3',  32- 

FAMILY,  C.  Sumner,  7. 
Father,  C.  Sumner,  3-6,  35. 
Felton,  C.  C.,  20,  39. 
Fessenden,W.  P. ,88,  172, 199,  271. 
Fish,  H.,  283,  289,  290,  296,  300, 

305- 
Foreign  affairs,  162,  168,  209,  257, 

299>  3°5  \  Committee  on,   162, 
^  299,  306. 

Freedman's  Bureaji,  241. 
Freedom      National,    speech,    C. 

Sumner,  78-83. 

Free-Soil  party,  46,  53,  64,  87. 
Fremont,  J.  C.,  122,  199. 
Fugitive  Slave  Law,  47,  62,  74,  76, 

87,  89. 

Funeral,  C.  Sumner,  323. 
Furness,  W.  H.,  119,  225. 

GARDNER,  H.,  125. 

Garrison,  W.  L.,  49,  59,61. 

Georgia,  re-admitted,  310. 

Giddings,  J.,  68,  79. 

Gooch,  D.  W.,  218. 

Grant,  U.  S.,  198,  217,  241.  266, 

273,281-300,  311,  314,  316. 
Greeley,  H.,  202,  312,  314 
Grimes,  J.  W.,  149,  171,  271. 

HABITS    and     characteristics,    C. 
Sumner,  9-15,  18,  30-32,  36,  37. 

42,  33<  63,  70,  107,  142,  147.  187, 

222.  224,  229. 


Hale,  J,  P.,  68,  70,  87,  103,  172. 

Hamlin,  H.,  140,  201, 

Hampton,  W.,  275. 

Harvard  College,  8. 

Hayti,  168. 

High  Joint  Commission,  299,  305. 

Hillard,G.  S.,  8,  17,20. 

Hoar,  G.  F.,  42. 

Howe,  S.  G.,  20,  35,  39. 

Hunter,  R.  M.  T.,  70,  146. 

Huntington,  F.  H.,  120. 

ILLNESS,    C.   Sumner,   126,    130, 

320. 
Impeachment,  265-272. 

JOHNSON,  A.,  172,  199,  214,  219, 

235,  244,  253,  265,  271,  282. 
Johnson-Clarendon  treaty,  283. 
Johnson,  Mrs.  W.,  143. 

KANSAS,  88,93-95,  121,  135. 
Kansas,   Crime    against,    speech, 

C.  Sumner,  108. 
Kemble,  F.,  15,  141. 
Know-Nothing  party,  96,  97,  122, 

123. 
Kuklux  Klan,  252. 

LAMAR,  J.  Q.  C.,  324. 

Lav/ School,  9,  10,  17  ;  office,  :6» 

17- 
Legislation,  general,  187,  194,  207, 

258 ;     financial,    257  ;     foreign 

affairs,  299;  railroads,  191,  195; 

political,  169,  189,  239,  251,  307. 
Liberty  party,  312. 
Lincoln,  A.,  122,  140, 148, 154, 160, 

162,  169,  173,  176, 180,  192,  197, 

200,  204,  207,  211,  214,  215,  217; 

Mrs.  A.,  161,  213. 
LL.  D..  degree  of,  C.  Sumner,  134. 
Longfellow,   H.   W.,    20,    35.   39, 

106.  107. 
Louisiana,  211-213,  278. 


INDEX. 


329 


MAGOUN,  G.  F.,  286. 

Mann,  H.,  17,20. 

Mason,  J.  M.,  70,  in,  112,  163. 

Massachusetts,  Legislature  of,  ap 

proval,  117,   247;    censure    and 

repeal,  318,  319. 

McClellan,  G.  B.,  173,  198,  203. 
Mexico,  168. 
Midnight  alarms,  C.  Sumner,  147, 

218. 
Miracle  of  the  Slave,  picture  of,  64, 

*33- 
Mission  and  influence,  C.  Sumner, 

84,  132. 

Missouri  Compromise,  47,  88. 
Mother,  C.  Sumner,  8,  261. 
Motley,}.  L.,  283,  289,  290,  291, 

296-298. 

NEBRASKA,  251. 

Nominations,  C.  Sumner,  54,  122, 


ORATIONS,  49-51. 

PACIFIC  RAILROAD,  195. 

Parker,  T.,  71. 

Pendleton,  G.  H.,  274. 

Philadelphia,  visit,  C.  Sumner,  16. 

Phillips,  WM  8,  49,  59,  117,  247. 

Pierce,  E.  L.,  24,  25,  213. 

Pierce,  F.,  86,  103,  107,  121. 

Political  conditions,  44-45,  69,  86; 
135,  140,  149-151,  169,  197,  202- 
205. 

Political  philosophy,  C.  Sumner, 
268. 

Pomeroy,  S.  C.,  171,  172,  198,  262. 

Poore,  B.  P.,  318. 

Prescott,  W.  H.,  39. 

President,  —  Adams,  8,  68  ;  Pierce, 
86,  103,  107,  121  ;  Buchanan, 
86,  141,  149;  Lincoln,  154,  160, 
162,  169,  173,  176,  180,  192,  197, 
200,  204,  207,211,  214,  215,  217; 


Johnson,  219,  235-239,  244,  253, 
265,  271,  282;  Grant,  273,  274, 
283-300,  311,316. 

QUINCY,  J.   P.,  4,  5,8,   22,  II7. 

RAILROADS,  191,  195. 

Rand,  B.,  16. 

Reception  in  Boston,  to  C.  Sumner, 

119. 
Reconstruction,  190,  203,  211,216, 

235  sg.,  250-256,  278. 
Republican  party,  rise  of,  96. 
Residence,  C.    Sumner,  144,  262, 

264,  301-306. 
Rice,  A.,  226. 
Richmond,  capture  of,  215. 

SAN  DOMINGO,  257,  291-300. 
Schurz,  C.,  224,  241,  310. 
Senate,  172,  187,  192. 
Seward,  W.  H.,  68,   70,    88,    108, 
128,  140,  149,  152, 159,  160,162, 

169,  173,  200,  217,  237,  238,  259, 
282. 

Slidell,  J.,  163,  246. 

Smalley,  G.  W.,  285. 

Social  position,  C.  Sumner,  16,  38, 

52,  99,  100,  103,  120,  226. 
Squatter  sovereignty,  47,  87. 
Stanton,  E.  M.,  149,152,  159,  217, 

265,  266,  271. 
Statue  of  Liberty,  145. 
Stevens,  T.,  190,  209,  247. 
Story,  J.,  4,  12,  13,  15-17,  19,  22, 
St.  Thomas,  282. 

Sumner,  Charles.  Ancestors,  3 ; 
parents,  3-6,  35,  261  ;  family, 
7,  8  ;  birth,  7 ;  death,  322-324 ; 
education,  8-16 ;  marriage  and 
divorce,  261-264,  319;  Europe, 
22-33,  I2S-i34,  315  ;  assault 
113  ;  illness,  126,  130,  320  ;  pub 
lications,  prizes,  15  ;  Commis 
sioner  U.  S.  Court,  1 8  ;  Con- 


330 


INDEX. 


stitutional  Convention,  87  ;  elec 
tions  to  Senate,  65-69,  123,  124, 
173-175,  280  ;  amendments  to 
Constitution,  —  Thirteenth,  208- 
210  ;  Fourteenth,  243-253  ;  Fif 
teenth,  278-280.  Appearance,  9, 
222  ;  battle-flags  resolution,  317- 
319  ;  censure  by  Massachusetts 
Legislature,  317-319;  character 
and  qualities,  2,  19,  23,  39,  51, 
158,  167,  231,  234  ;  Chief-Justice, 
appointment  of,  193  ;  degree  of 
LL.D.,  134  ;  English  mission, 
157  ;  entrance  into  politics,  49  ; 
eulogies  upon,  324,  325  ;  foreign 
affairs,  162,  166,  168,  209,  257, 
299,  305  ;  Fort  Monroe,  visit  to, 
215;  habits  and  characteristics, 
9-i5>3°>  32,  36»  37,  42,  53,63, 

70,   107,   142,  147,  187,  222,    224, 

229;  High  Joint  Commission,299, 
305  ;  midnight  alarms,  147,  218  ; 
mission  and  influence,  84,  132  ; 
nomination,  54,  122,315;  Pome- 
roy  circular,  198 ;  reception  in 
Boston,  119;  residence,  144,  262, 
264,  301-306  ;  relations  with 
Chase,  1 60;  Grant,  281  sg.t  311- 
314  ;  Johnson, 199-202,  214,  219, 
220;  Lincoln,  160,  161,  173,  192, 
198,  213;  Seward,  152,  160-162, 
259,  282  ;  Senate,  70,  172,  187; 
Stanton,  266 ;  social  position, 
1 6,  38,  52,  100,  103,  1 20,  226; 
ostracism  in  Boston,  52,  120  ; 
Washington,  99;  work,  70,  92, 

»57- 

Sumner,  Charles,  family  of.  Al 
bert,  7,  35,  127,  225  ;  Alice 
Hooper,  Mrs.  261  ;  Charles 
Pinckney,  3-6,  35,  38;  George, 
7,  35,  107,  260  ;  Job,  3 ;  Julia 
(Mrs..  Hastings),  8,  35,  36; 
Mary,  35.  36  ;  Matilda,  7  ;  Relief 
,  Jacobs,  Mrs.,  4,  261 ;  William,  3. 


Sumner,  Charles,  speeches,  54,  97 ; 
preparation  of,  128,  229  ;  general 
legislation,  194 ;  Alaska,  258- 
260 ;  Amendments,  208,  243, 
247,  278  ;  Barbarism  of  Slavery, 
145  ;  Centennial,  321  ;  Civil 
Rights,  307 ;  Colorado,  250  ; 
Cooper  Union,  148, 181  ;  Eman 
cipation,  158,  178,  181,  185  ; 
Freedom  National,  78 ;  Freed- 
man's  Bureau,  241  ;  Fugitive 
Slave  Law,  62,  209  ;  Grant,  276, 
310;  Granville  Sharp,  98;  Im 
peachment,  268 ;  Johnson-Clar 
endon  Treaty,  283;  Kansas,  108; 
Lincoln,  205,  207 ;  Louisiana, 
211  ;  Missouri  Compromise,  88; 
Railroads,  191,  195  ;  Reconstruc 
tion,  239,  254 ;  San  Domingo, 
292-300;  Tenure  of  Office,  251, 
255  ;  "Trent,"  163-165  ;  True 
Grandeur  of  Nations,  40-43  ;  Vir 
ginia,  217  ;  West  Virginia,  190. 

TANEY,  R.  B.,  103,  137,  193. 

Tenure  of  Office  Act,  251-255. 

Toombs,  R.,  246. 

"  Trent  "  affair,  163-165. 

True  Grandeur  of  Nations,  speech, 

C.  Sumner,  40-43. 
Trumbull,  L.,  271,  312. 

VIRGINIA,  reconstruction  of,  216. 

WADE,  B.,  172,  219,  251,  271. 
War,  civil,  154,  159,  197,  209,  215. 
Washington,  city  of,  16,  100,  141, 

144. 
Webster,  D.,  8,  n,  17,  48,  52,  65, 

66,  86,  101. 

Welling,  J.  C.,  103,  125. 
West  Virginia,  190. 
Whipple,  E.  P.,  167,  300. 
Wilson,  H.,  48,  64,  116,  123,  171, 

176,  214,  307,  314. 
Winthrop,  R.  C.,  8,  52,66.    * 


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